I 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 


PRESENTED  BY 

PROF.  CHARLES  A.  KOEdir)  AND 

MRS.  PRUDENCE  y^OFOID 


\. 


\ 


) 


■^  J  n 


THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA 


'  All  hail,  Liberia !  hail ! 
Arise  and  now  prevail 

O'er  all  thy  foes. 
In  truth  and  righteousness, 
In  all  the  Arts  of  Peace, 
Advance  and  still  increase 

Though  hosts  oppose ! 

*  At  the  loud  call  we  rise, 
And  press  toward  the  prize 

In  glory's  race. 
All  redolent  of  fame, 
The  land  to  which  we  came, 
We  breathe  the  inspiring  flame. 
And  onward  press. 

'  Here  Liberty  shall  dwell, 
Here  Justice  shall  prevail, 

Religion  here  ; 
To  this,  fair  virtue's  dome, 
Meek  innocence  may  come 
And  find  a  peaceful  home, 
And  know  no  fear.' 

Hilary  Teague  of  Liberia. 


THE 


LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA; 

Being  tbe  ©utcome  of  IRetlecttons  on  our 
©wn  people.  (^ 


BY 

FREDERICK  ALEXANDER  DURHAM, 

AN  AFRICAN, 

OF   LINCOLN'S   INN  (STUDENT-AT-LAW). 


WITH  AN  INTRODUCTION 

BY 

MADAME  LA  COMTESSE  C.  HUGO. 


LONDON: 
ELLIOT  STOCK,    62,    PATERNOSTER   ROW,   E.C. 

1892. 


INTRODUCTION. 


I  WAS  quite  a  child  when  I  read  '  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,'  by 
Mrs.  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe,  and  became  enthusiastic  for 
the  abolition  of  slavery.  My  heart  was  full  of  anxious 
thought  on  this  subject.  Later  in  life  the  tragedy  of 
'  Toussaint  L'Ouverture,'  by  Lamartine,  opened  my  mind  to 
fresh  considerations.  After  reading  it  I  apprehended  that 
the  sons  of  Ham  have  precisely  the  same  human,  as  well 
as  civil,  rights  as  have  the  sons  of  Shem  and  of  Japheth.  The 
passionate  interest  which  my  uncle,  Victor  Hugo,  took  in 
the  fate  of  the  generous  but  unfortunate  John  Brown 
further  fixed  my  attention  on  this  question,  which  has 
humanitarian  as  well  as  social  aspects.  And  when  recently 
reading  books  and  articles  relating  to  the  subject  of  the 
emancipation  of  Africa's  sons,  I  have  added  indignation  to 
compassion. 

It  is  not  right  to  reduce  the  ethics  of  that  important 
question  to  the  proportions  of  a  mere  work  of  mercy.  It 
ought  to  be  regarded  as  one  of  the  gravest  questions  of  our 
time — the  final  blow  struck  at  an  old  tree,  which  mould  has 
long  invaded  and  rotted. 

This  great  question  of  the  emancipation  of  the  African 
race  has  more  than  one  interesting  aspect.  Perhaps  its 
most  striking  feature  is  its  connection  with  human  progress 


vi  INTRODUCTION, 

and  with  advancing  Christianity.  The  Gospel  may  be 
a  creation  or  an  imitation,  but  it  is  certainly  full  of  social 
and  moral  principles  which  are  useful  and  adaptable  to  the 
conditions  of  every  period,  because  they  are  essentially  wise 
and  just.  If  religion  or  Christianity  means  the  actual 
practice  of  Gospel  principles,  then  even  the  most  advanced 
man  can  make  no  reasonable  objection  to  Christianity. 

But  things  do  not  seem  trending  in  the  direction  of  the 
triumph  of  Gospel  principles.  Human  Governments  make 
their  boast  of  their  reverence  for  religion,  and  yet  they 
commit  all  sorts  of  frauds  and  crimes  against  dependent 
populations,  which  are  the  antipodes  of  the  requirements 
and  recommendations  of  the  New  Testament. 

Both  Europeans  and  Americans  may,  with  the  help  of 
Messrs.  Froude,  Laird  Clowes,  and  H.  M.  Stanley,  regard 
themselves  as  the  natural  and  supernatural  'Magisterial 
Guardians '  of  the  Ethiopian  race,  and  they  may  proclaim, 
with  mingled  blasphemy  and  humour,  that  the  Africans — or 
at  least  the  mass  of  them — are  half  brutes  and  animals. 
But  no  right-minded,  no  fair-thinking  man,  will  follow  these 
writers  in  so  savage  and  unworthy  a  conclusion. 

The  great '  pack-horse '  of  the  Africophobists  is  a  phrase 
which  occurs  in  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures :  '  And^ 
Canaan  will  be  their  servant.'  Mr.  Jos.  L.  Janvier,  a 
learned  doctor  and  Haytian  diplomatist,  in  one  of  his 
remarkable  and  witty  books,  has  chosen  these  words  for  the 
epigraph  :  *  Hayti  et  ses  Visiteurs.'  We  are  exactly  of  his 
opinion.  This  Bible  sentence  is  a  very  difficult  one  to 
apply  in  a  universal  way.  The  Bible  is  full  of  merely 
personal  incidents  and  personal  references,  and  we  have  no 
right  to  look  in  every  part  of  it  for  such  perfect  and 
absolute  directions  as  the  Gospel  alone  can  afford.* 

*  But  apart  from  all  this  :  had  not  Ham  had  three  other 
sons   besides  Canaan  ?    Were   not   Gush,    Mizraim  and  Phut 


INTRODUCTION.  vii 

Mr.  Durham's  book,  '  The  Lone-Star  of  Liberia,'  offers  to 
our  consideration  a  project  which  I  regard  as  in  every  way  a 
hopeful  one  both  for  the  African  and  for  the  Caucasian.  He 
pleads  for  the  removal  of  the  slave — enfranchised  slave — 
populations  to  the  republic  of  Liberia,  where  there  is 
abundant  space  for  them  all,  and  where  a  certain  population 
is  already  established  which  is  doing  its  best  to  fashion  for 
itself  a  civilized  life  and  society  and  government.  The 
climate  of  Liberia  is  good,  and  the  soil  is  fertile ;  and  it  is 
an  altogether  legitimate  and  reasonable  desire  on  the  part  of 
the  sons  of  Ham  that  they  should  form  a  united  and  inde- 
pendent race  on  that  very  same  continent  from  whence 
their  fathers  were  arbitrarily,  cruelly,  and  in  ways  involving 
untold  misery  and  degradation,  dragged  away. 

Mr.  Laird  Clowes  himself,  in  his  '  Black  America,'  wrote 
(see  the  last  chapter,  '  The  Ideal  Solution  ') :  *  If  America 
would  do  its  duty  by  the  Negroes,  those  civilized  nations 
which  have  established  themselves  in  Africa  would,  in 
pursuance  of  their  own  interests,  aid  her.  Great  Britain, 
France,  and  Germany  would  each  and  all  welcome  the 
immigration  to  their  African  possessions  of  large  and 
leavening  bodies  of  American  blacks.'  Why  does  not  the 
government  at  Washington  endeavour  to  carry  out  this  plan, 
which  would  be  so  acceptable  to  the  African,  and  which 
would  relieve  the  States  of  one  of  their  heaviest  burdens  ? 
To  accomplish  the  scheme  only  requires  the  formation  of  a 
vigorous  financial  executive.  I  need  not  say  that  I  do  not 
believe  the  Government  at  Washington  is  disposed  to  con- 
firm the  old  Italian  motto  : 

Canaan's  elders  ?  Did  Noah  also  curse  Cush,  Mizraim  and 
Phut  ?  Are  Africans,  are  Ethiopians,  the  descendants  of 
Canaan  ?  If  they  are — we  presume,  on  the  authority  of  the 
Bible,  they  are — the  descendants  also  of  Canaan's  brothers, 
Cush,  Mizraim  and  Phut,  and  were  they  cursed  ?  ' 


viii  INTRODUCTION. 

'  Fra  il  dire  e  il  fare 
C  e  di  mezzo  il  mare.' 

('  Between  words  and  actions  there  is  an  ocean.') 

Authorities  in  a  country  like  America  are  not  disposed  to 
make  promises  only  for  that  kind  of  people  who  can  be 
contented  with  chaff.  Why,  then,  when  the  question  has 
been  before  it  of  helping  to  create  a  powerful  black  re- 
public in  Liberia,  has  it  not  brought  the  matter  to  an  issue  ? 
Can  it  be  that  these  excellent  '  Magisterial  Guardians '  have 
such  an  amount  of  love  to  their  black  brethren  that  they 
are  afraid  of  exposing  them  to  the  perils  of  a  new-born  in- 
dependence ?     What  a  wonderful  solicitude  ! 

Mr.  F.  A.  Durham,  the  author  of  this  book,  is  animated 
by  the  eagerness  of  youth  and  the  ardour  of  patriotic  long- 
ings to  secure  the  autonomy  of  his  race.  He  mentions 
several  distinguished  men  and  women  who  belong  to  the 
race,  and  judging  by  the  rapid  yet  great  attainments  and 
capabilities  of  these  Ethiopians,  we  may  reasonably  hope 
soon  to  see  all  the  progeny  of  Ham — all  the  descendants  of 
Cush,  Mizraim,  Phut  and  Canaan — fairly  civilized.  But 
ought  not  the  enterprise  of  securing  that  civilization  to  be 
placed  in  the  hands  of  the  Africans  themselves ;  that  is,  in 
the  hands  of  those  who  are  already  in  the  forward  rank,  and 
have  shown  talent  for  learning,  ability  to  fill  civil  and 
governmental  offices,  and  capacity  for  good  citizenship  ? 

Our  own  convictions  are,  in  relation  to  the  social  move- 
ment, that  the  next  stage  of  the  world's  progress  will  witness 
the  triumph  of  Christian  Socialism.  But  at  the  same  time  we 
admit  that  Africans,  if  they  remain  as  they  are  now,  cannot 
hope  to  march  under  the  flag  of  the  new  social  system.  They 
must  go  through  every  phase  of  civil  and  national  organiza- 
tion. Their  aspirations  towards  U7ie  patrie,  and  their  wish 
to  gain  autonomy,  are,  however,  praiseworthy,  and  indicate 


r™'" ■'  INTRODUCTION.  ix 

awakening  intelligence  in  them.  Therefore  we  think  that 
every  man  who  values  his  own  national  liberties  ought  to  sym- 
pathize with  and  support  the  Africans  in  their  enterprise, 
which  is  in  itself,  and  cannot  fail  to  prove  in  its  results,  an 
advancement  for  the  race  in  social  and  national  life,  in  all 
that  properly  goes  into  the  term  '  civilization.'  We  shall 
never,  of  course,  expect,  request,  or  call  in  the  sympathy 
and  support  of  men  like  a  messenger  of  the  Times,  or 
a  great  representative  of  Downing  Street,  and  consequently 
our  beliefs  are  not  likely  to  be  placed  in  either  '  Black 
America '  or  *  Darkest  Africa.'  Let  us  hope  that  H. 
M.  Stanley  has  learned  a  useful  lesson  by  falling  from 
general  enthusiasm  into  general  reprobation ;  but  the  lesson 
was  a  severe  one  for  the  public,  as  reminding  them  that 
sober  mistrust  of  people  who  come  with  wonderful  tales 
from  far  countries  is  no  unnecessary  precaution.  There  is  in 
Stanley's  story  matter  enough  to  arouse  our  indignation, 
and  indignation  is  not  always  a  vain  sentiment.  I  might 
call  slavery  itself  a  prime  mover  in  modern  civilization,  for 
the  indignation  which  this  long  and  grave  infamy  has  gene- 
rated has  been  the  great  stimulant  in  the  struggle  which  has 
at  last  resulted  in  the  African  enfranchisement.  Independ- 
ence and  autonomy  will  now  follow,  and  when  these  come 
they  will  prove  to  benefit  not  only  those  directly  interested, 
but  also  the  whole  civilized  races. 

The  author  of  '  The  Lone-Star  of  Liberia '  in  his  third 
chapter  gives  a  painful  exhibition  of  the  gross  immoralities 
of  well-known  people  who  have  not  black  skins.  His  story 
is  not  new — there  is  nothing  new  that  is  true — but  the 
terrible  record  will  call  attention  to  the  unreasonableness  of 
Caucasian  blame  of  African  immorality.  The  Africans 
made  their  escape  from  the  debasing  conditions  of  slavery 
only  very  recently,  and  it  is  altogether  unreasonable  to 
expect  from  them  a  perfection  which  Caucasians,  who  have 


X  INTRODUCTION. 

had  ages  of  independence  and  civilization,  have  so  demon- 
strably failed  to  reach — a  perfection  which,  indeed,  does 
not  seem  to  be  possible  in  this  world.  Rich  and  powerful 
men  of  the  '  magisterial '  race  commit  far  worse  iniquities 
than  can  be  charged  at  the  door  of  the  Africans,  but  having 
at  their  disposal  arsenals  and  constables,  army  and  navy, 
judges  and  clerks  and  law,  they  can  cover  over  their  wrong- 
doings, and  their  tarnished  honour  and  secret  infamies  can 
be  hidden  from  view,  and,  if  discovered,  recriminations  are 
prevented  by  shutting  the  mouth  of  the  scandalized  in  a 
variety  of  ways. 

Ham's  son,  on  the  contrary,  is  always  vilified,  and  ca- 
lumniated, and  ill-treated,  and  the  worst  that  can  be  said  of 
him  is  paraded  in  view.  Surely  the  time  is  now  come 
when  all  prejudices  should  disappear  !  Are  you  not  of  my 
opinion  ?  Then  let  us  have  more  patience :  Eroia's  walls 
fell,  the  Bastille  fell,  the  Vatican's  doors  fell,  and  prejudices 
against  the  African  race  will  one  day  fall.  At  the  end 
righteousness  always  wins  the  day. 

COMTESSE  C.  HUGO. 

London, 
March,  1892. 


PREFACE 


I.  The  aspersions  and  libels  cast  on  the  African  Race  by 
Mr.  W.  Laird  Clowes  in  his  '  Black  Anaerica/  first  issued  in 
February  of  this  year  (1891)  by  Messrs.  Cassell  and  Co., 
his  publishers,  impose  on  me  the  duty  of  repelling  and  re- 
fating  the  same.  Having  dealt  with  Laird  Clowes  at  length 
in  the  book  to  which  this  is  meant  to  be  the  preface,  I  have 
little  to  say  here  so  far  as  his  (Laird  Clowes)  relations  with 
the  African  are  concerned.  Yet  I  cannot  forbear  mentioning 
that  while  Homer,  one  of  the  greatest  poets,  and  Herodotus, 
the  '  Father  of  History ' — mighty  and  illustrious  Greeks  of 
yore  both  of  them — have  eulogized  and  made  immortal  — 
Homer  in  song  and  Herodotus  in  history — the  Ethiopian 
Race,  Mr.  W.  Laird  Clowes  and  Mr.  James  Anthony  Froude, 
men  who  are  not  universally  known  even  in  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland,  and  men  who  are  manifestly  ignorant  concern- 
ing African  History,  have  thought  fit  to  vilify  it.  They  are 
surely  men  far  inferior  to  Homer  and  Herodotus  in  intel- 
lectual attainments — they  are  but  as  pigmies  before  these 
intellectual  giants ;  and  nobleness  of  soul  towards  their 
African  or  Ethiopian  fellow-men  does  not  seem  to  be  theirs. 
Whatever  may  be  the  accomplishments  of  Clowes  and 
Froude,  the  latter  more  particularly,  as  British  literati,  we 
cannot  withhold  the  opinion  that  this  great  writer  does  not 


xii  PREFACE. 

always  prove  the  great  man  in  his  estimate  of  other  races 
than  his  own.  There  is  often  an  important  distinction 
between  the  great  author  and  the  great  fna7i.  Two  of  the 
greatest  writers  the  white  man's  world  produced  in  the 
eighteenth  century  were  Voltaire  and  Jean  Jacques  Rous- 
seau. But  they  were  men  whose  nobility  of  character  bore 
no  comparison  with  the  greatness  of  their  intellectual  or 
their  literary  power. 

II.  While  this  work  is  a  criticism  of  these  critics,  it  is 
also  meant  to  be  a  summary  of  the  history  of  the  Ethiopian 
Race  in  Western  Africa.  No  person  can  be  properly 
termed  educated  who  knows  little  or  nothing  of  the  history 
of  his  own  race  and  of  his  own  country.  The  African  or 
other  Ethiopian  reader  who  reads  Liberian  Blyden's  '  Chris- 
tianity, Islam,  and  the  Negro  Race,'  will  have  more  than  a 
fair  knowledge  of  the  History  of  his  Race  and  Fatherland ; 
and  I  venture  to  hope  that  this  work  will  be  found  a  not 
unsuitable  appendix  or  supplement  to  that  work. 

How  many  Africans,  both  educated  and  uneducated,  there 
are  who  foolishly  believe  that  the  Ethiopian  Race  has  not 
produced  even  one  truly  eminent  scholar,  or  philosopher,  or 
soldier,  simply  because  they  do  not  happen  to  know  of  any  ! 
There  are  too  many,  unfortunately,  who  prefer  to  remain  in 
ignorance  ;  while  there  are  many  more  who,  although  they 
do  not  know  of  one  remarkable  African,  take  no  pains  to  find 
out  for  themselves  what  every  intelligent  African  should  find 
out  and  know  concerning  his  own  people.  This  work  will, 
it  is  hoped,  supply  a  long-felt  deficiency.  And  at  the  same 
time  it  would  be  well  for  those  who  disparage  my  people — 
the  African  Race — to  read  these  '  Reflections  on  Our  Own 
People,'  and  also  Dr.  Edward  Wilmot  Blyden's  'Chris- 
tianity, Islam,  and  the  Negro  Race,'"^  before  rushing  to  any 

*  A  larger  and  more  exhaustive  work  than   Dr.  Blyden's  is 
Africo-American  Colonel  the  Honourable  George  W.  William's 


PREFACE.  xiu 

hasty  conclusions,  which  are  the  untrustworthy  consequence 
of  incomplete  and  misguided  researches,  which  have  not 
duly  revealed  the  achievements  performed  by  the  Africans 
through  their  eminent  soldiers,  governors,  and  literati. 
It  is  easy  to  argue  that  as  Africa  has  never  produced  any 
great  men,  the  Ethiopian  Race  must  be  inferior  to  the 
Caucasian. 

After  having  fully  exposed,  refuted,  and  corrected  the 
mistakes  and  misrepresentations  of  Mr.  W.  Laird  Clowes,  I 
have  thought  it  advisable  to  point  out  to  the  African  in  the 
United  States  of  North  America,  and  to  other  non-Liberian 
Africans  generally,  what  an  important  and  advantageous 
thing  it  is  for  them  to  have  a  Free  and  Independent 
African  Fatherland  in  Republican  Liberia. 

The  African  will  and  can  learn  the  language  of,  and  dress 
like,  his  white  governor ;  but  he  cannot,  and  will  never  be, 
Caucasianized.  It  is  impossible.  History  shows  no  prece- 
dent of  a  subject  race  becoming  thoroughly  like  their  rulers, 
when  those  rulers  happen  to  belong  to  an  essentially 
different  race.  The  African  will  always  be  an  African.  His 
nature  and  racial  instincts  will  always  remain  what  they  are 
to-day.  On  the  other  hand,  the  Caucasian  will  always  be  a 
Caucasian.  His  racial  peculiarities  or  characteristics  will 
remain  the  same.  And  it  is  better,  in  the  interests  of 
humanity  as  a  whole,  that  the  races  should  keep  their  dis- 
tinctions. It  is  '  kismet.'  We  all  know  that  the  white 
man  has  been  on  the  Gold  Coast  more  than  400  years,  but 
has  not  the  Gold  Coaster  just  the    same  peculiarities   or 

'  History  of  the  Ethiopian  Race  in  America,'  in  two  volumes, 
from  1619  to  1800,  and  from  1800  to  1880,  published  by  G.  P. 
Putnam's  sons.  We  would  certainly  recommend  that,  as  well 
as  the  Honourable  Liberian  Blyden's  work,  to  the  self-respect- 
ing, and  only  to  the  self-respecting  African,  for  close  attention 
and  study. 


xiv  PREFACE. 

racial  characteristics  as  his  forefathers  had  before  him  ? 
The  European  has  failed  to  Europeanize  him.  Nor  could 
the  African  Africanize  the  Caucasian  were  he  to  try  to. 

The  African  subject  of  the  Caucasian  has  qualities  which 
he  cannot  develop  in  the  land  of  the  white  man  and  the 
stranger.  He  can  only  develop  in  a  free  and  independent 
Fatherland  of  his  own.  Where  can  the  African  develop 
them  so  well  as  in  Liberia  ? 

Is  Liberia  improving  ?  It  has  been  shown  that  it  is.  But 
if  that  be  not  so,  and  the  West  African  Republic  is  either 
stationary  or  retrograding,  why  does  not  the  non-Liberian 
African  hurry  to  the  rescue  of  Liberia  and  make  it  progress? 

As  long  as  the  African  remains  under  white  rule,  so  long 
will  he  be  subjected  to  inconveniences  and  disadvantages. 
What  the  white  man  says,  the  average  African,  be  he 
educated  or  uneducated,  with  charming  simplicity  implicitly 
believes  in.  The  white  man  tells  the  black  man  that  God 
is  white  and  the  Devil  black,  and  the  average  African  un- 
reasoningly  accepts  that  doctrine.  The  Liberian,  the  Hay- 
tian,  and  the  Dominican,  as  a  matter  of  course,  know 
better.  They  have  more  sense.  They  reason  for  them- 
selves, and  do  not  allow  the  white  man  to  lay  down  the 
law  for  them  in  this  and  other  like  matters. 

There  are  Africans  (I  mean,  of  course,  those  living  under 
and  subject  to  the  white  man)  who  fervently  wish  they  had 
never  been  born  black,  and  who  deem  it  the  greatest 
privilege  to  have  white  associates.  Vanity  is  a  sin,  they  say, 
but  I  think  it  is  better  for  a  black  man  to  be  vain  of  his 
skin  than  wish  he  had  never  been  born  black.  When  a 
man  wishes  that  he  had  never  been  born  an  African,  he 
must,  of  course,  be  ashamed  of  a  fellow-African  whenever 
he  sees  him,  particularly  if  he  happens  to  be  dwelling  in  a 
country  where  the  whites  are  either  in  equal  proportion  to 
blacks,  or  in  a  large  majority,  and  are  the  rulers. 


PREFA  CE.  XV 

Liberian  Blyden,  in  his  '  Christianity,  Islam,  and  the 
Negro  Race,'  forcibly  calls  one's  attention  to  the  cringing 
and  servile  attitude  of  the  subject  black  towards  the  ruling 
white ;  and  I  am  of  opinion  that  Blyden  is  justified  in  so 
writing.  It  is  only  too  true.  It  is  true  not  only  of  the  un- 
educated, but  even  of  the  educated,  African  living  beneath 
the  sway  of  the  European  and  the  American. 

There  is  another  equally  important  matter  which  Mr. 
Blyden  forcibly  brings  home  to  one's  mind.  He  asserts 
that  the  Africans  who  were  transported  to  the  American 
Continent  (the  West  Indies  included)  as  slaves  were  not  as 
a  rule  of  the  very  best  stamp  or  class.  And  I  think  he  is 
certainly  justified  in  making  that  assertion.  I  must  be 
understood  as  interpreting  his  meaning  in  this  way :  The 
Africans  as  a  whole  are  not  satisfied  with  their  position 
under  the  rule  of  the  white.  But  does  he  not  continue  to 
remain  under  the  rule  of  the  white,  while  Liberia  has 
been  free  and  independent  since  1847  ?  The  British 
African  grumbles.  He  wants  Home  Rule  and  Representa- 
tion. There  are  in  Liberia  Independence  pure  and  simple, 
an  elective  Congress,  and  a  full-fledged  Government.  The 
British,  like  the  American  African,  is  free  to  go  where  he 
lists.  Still,  Liberia  has  no  charms  for  him.  The  American 
African  sees  his  kinsmen  and  comrades  daily  lynched  in  the 
United  States  ;  does  he  make  any  vigorous  and  manly  efforts 
to  quit  America,  and  be  free  and  independent  in  Liberia  ? 
Neither  the  American  nor  the  British  Africans,  nor  any 
other  non-Liberian  Africans  subject  to  white  rule,  do  any- 
thing of  the  kind. 

This  is  how,  then,  I  think  Dr.  Blyden  is  justified  in 
making  that  statement.  For  were  the  Africans  living  under 
Caucasian  rule  the  descendants  of  men,  Africans  and 
Ethiopians,  after  the  type  of  the  Liberians  and  the  Haytians 


xvi  PREFACE. 

and  the  Abyssinians  and  others,  they  would  not  continue 
to  remain  in  their  present  position. 

If  the  so-called  leaders  of  the  Africans  in  the  United 
States  of   North   America   had    any  sense  of  shame,  any 
spark  of  manliness,  any  touch  of  dignity,  they  would  cer- 
tainly have    marshalled  their    hosts,   after   having  brought 
pressure  to  bear  on  the  Yankee  Government  for  a  subsidy, 
and  left  America,  with  her  lynchings  and  other  oppressions 
and    persecutions,    which    is   their    land   of    bondage,    far 
behind.     Even    now   it   is   not   too  late  to  do   so.     The 
person  who   is   admitted  on   all  sides   to   be  the  leading 
African    in   the   United    States  of  North    America   is   un- 
doubtedly Mr.  Frederick  Douglass,  the  American  Minister 
to  the  Haytian   Republic  ;    while  it  does  not  admit  of  a 
doubt    but   that    Sir   William    Conrad   Reeves,    the   Chief 
Justice  of  Barbadoes,  is  the  leading  British  African.     I  pro- 
pose to  deal  with  these  men,  and  to  refer  to  their  position. 
I  shall  take  each  separately.    I  take  Mr.  Frederick  Douglass, 
He  is  the  American  Minister  to  Hayti  at  present ;  when  his 
term  is  at  an  end,  he  will  retire  on   a  pension.     He  will 
retire  into  the  obscurity  from  which  he  temporarily  emerged. 
The  reason  for  his  representing  the  United  States  in  Hayti 
is    that    no    white   American    would    accept    the   post   of 
American    Minister    to    Hayti    were    it   offered    to    him. 
Frederick  Douglass  would  not  be  in  his  right  senses  were 
he   to  indulge   in   the  idea  that   some  day  he  will  be  ap- 
pointed to  represent  the  United  States  of  North  America 
as  American  Minister    in   Europe.     He  would  be  in  the 
same    demented  state  were  he   to  believe    for  a  moment 
that  the  President  of  the  United  States  of  North  America 
will   send  for  him  and  charge  him  with  the  formation  of 
a  Cabinet,  or  believe  for  a  moment  that  he  will  be  made  a 
Member  of  any  American  Cabinet.     Were  Mr.  Frederick 
Douglass  to  come  forward  some  day  as  a  candidate,  with 


PREFACE.  xvii 

the  view  to  be  elected  to  the  Presidentship  of  the  United 
States,  and  to  sit  in  the  Chair  in  which  George  Washington, 
John  Adams,  Thomas  Jefferson,  James  Madison,  James 
Monroe,  and  the  seventeen  other  Presidents  have  sat,  he 
would  be  promptly  arrested  by  indignant  Americans,  and 
be  lodged  in  bedlam  as  a  dangerous  lunatic,  there  to  be 
detained  during  the  President's  pleasure. 

But  what  can  he  not  be  in  the  Republic  of  Liberia,  if  he 
becomes  a  Liberian  ?  In  Liberia  he  can  be  President,  an 
ordinary  or  even  chief  Member  of  the  Liberian  Government. 
As  a  Liberian  he  can  also  be  the  Liberian  Minister  at  one 
of  the  European  Courts,  or  in  the  United  States  of  North 
America. 

The  Chief  Justice  of  Barbadoes,  Sir  William  Conrad 
Reeves,  Knt.  Bach.,  is  himself  placed  in  a  predicament 
similar  to  that  of  Mr.  Frederick  Douglass.  When  his  term 
as  Chief  Justice  of  Barbadoes  expires,  he  will  have  to  retire 
on  a  pension.  He  will  not  be  promoted  to  the  post  of 
Chief  Justice  of  one  of  the  Australasian  Colonies,  nor  will 
he  be  promoted  to  the  Chief  Justiceship  of  Newfoundland, 
or  the  Dominion  of  Canada.  He  would  be  termed  de- 
mented were  he  to  apply  for  the  Lord  Chief  Justiceship 
of  England  and  Wales,  or  the  Chief  Justiceship  of  Ireland, 
or  the  Lord  Justice  Clerkship  of  Scotland  on  the  first 
vacancy ;  or  were  he  to  apply  for  the  post  of  Lord  High 
Chancellor  of  England  and  Wales,  and  to  sit  on  the  wool- 
sack in  the  House  of  Lords,  or  that  of  Lord  Chancellor  of 
Ireland,  or  the  post  of  Lord  Justice  General  and  President 
of  Court  of  Session  of  Scotland  on  the  first  vacancy.  A 
lunacy  commission  would  be  instituted  to  inquire  into  the 
state  of  his  mind,  and  if  he  were  to  be  found  demented 
he  would  be  locked  up  in  bedlam  '  during  Her  Britannic 
Majesty's  pleasure  '  as  a  dangerous  lunatic.  Reeves  cannot 
aspire  to  a  higher  post  in  the  British  Isles.     But  in  Liberia 


xviii  PREFACE. 

he  can  be  accommodated  somehow  in  the  public  service. 
If  Douglass  and  Reeves  were  to  inform  the  Liberians  that 
they  would  make  use  of  their  name  and  position,  and  try 
their  level  best  to  take  with  them  as  many  Africans  to 
Liberia  as  were  willing  to  go,  would  the  Liberian  Govern- 
ment not  compensate  Douglass  and  Reeves  for  their  trouble 
and  time?  If  not,  then  I  am  much  mistaken  in  the 
Liberian  People  and  Government.  But  if  Frederick 
Douglass  and  Reeves  were  to  do  so,  they  would  earn 
immortal  renown.  Their  names  would  live  forever  and 
evermore  not  only  in  Liberian,  but  in  other  histories  and 
songs.  Will  they,  like  Moses  and  Aaron,  do  this,  or  even 
attempt  now  to  do  what  they  ought  to  have  done  long  ago  ? 
or  will  they,  from  want  of  genuine  ambition  and  through 
listless  apathy,  prefer  to  remain  in  obscurity  until  their 
Maker  calls  them  unto  Himself,  when  they  will  sink  into  the 
grave  in  Mother-Earth  comparatively  unwept,  unhonoured 
and  unsung  ?  I  fear  that  it  will  be  the  latter  course  that 
they  will  take.  Douglass  and  Reeves  have  eyes,  and  refuse 
to  see ;  they  have  ears,  and  refuse  to  hear. 

There  is  a  subject  on  which  I  should  like  to  say  a  few 
words  here.  It  is  the  use  of  the  words  Negro  and 
Coloured  by  Africans,  Europeans,  and  other  non-Africans. 
Ham's  descendants  are  Africans  by  Nation  and  Ethio- 
pians by  Race,  just  as  the  progeny  of  Japheth  are 
Europeans  by  Nation  and  Caucasians  by  Race.  We  do 
not  see  where  the  Negro  comes  in  at  all.  Again,  Africans 
and  other  Ethiopians  are  black,  as  Europeans  and  other 
Caucasians  are  white.  Here,  also,  we  do  not  see  where 
the  coloured  com.es  in  at  all.  It  seems  a  pity  that 
Africans  should  blindly  copy  everything  Europeans  and 
other  Caucasians  set  before  them.  Africans  should  be 
Men,  form  opinions  worthy  of  Men,  and  act  like  Men. 
I  am  bound  to  say,  with  Reginald  Scot,  who  flourished  in 


PREFACE.  xix 

the  reign  of  James  the  First  of  England  and  Ireland,  and 
Sixth  of  Scotland,  *  tnith  must  not  be  fueasured  by  titne^  for 
every  old  opinion  is  not  sound.  My  great  adversaries  are 
young  ignorance  and  old  custom.'' 

I  anticipate  that  many  of  my  readers  will  find  fault  with, 
and  object  to,  many  of  my  utterances  in  this  work.  I 
should  like  it  to  be  understood  that  1  am  not  asking  for 
mercy  or  pardon,  or  writing  in  the  'Am  I  not  a  man  and 
a  Brother  ?'  strain  of  the  days  of  slavery,  but  I  am  defend- 
ing and  attacking  vigorously,  squarely  and  fairly.  Not 
only  do  I  defend  my  fortifications  against  the  invader,  but 
I  assume  the  offensive  and  carry  on  the  war  in  the  enemy's 
territories.  I  have  written,  as  a  freeman^  not  only  true 
facts  and  justifiable  statements  as  known  by  me,  but  I  have 
also  given  free  and  independent  opinions  compatible  with 
the  dignity  of  the  freeman  and  the  free-born.  But,  I  ask, 
what  man  is  there  who  can  honestly  and  truly  say  that  his 
writing  or  writings  has  or  have  met  with  undiluted  favour 
or  pleasure  anywhere  and  amongst  any  people  ? 

What  I  think  the  British  or  white  reader  may  take 
objection  to  chiefly  is  my  third  chapter,  which  deals  with 
Immorality.  But  what  I  have  said  in  the  book  from 
beginning  to  end  I  stand  by  and  am  ready  to  repeat  again. 
It  is  a  fact  that  wherever  the  Africans  have  come  into  con- 
tact with  Caucasian  civilization,  and  lived  under  Caucasian 
domination,  they  (the  descendants  of  Ham)  have  been  con- 
taminated, demorahzed,  and  taught  to  wallow  in  the  mire  of 
immorality,  at  the  instance  of  and  under  the  direction  of 
their  white  and  unenviably  apt  preceptors — their  Caucasian 
civilizers. 

There  are  certain  things  W.  Laird  Clowes  says  in  his 
'  Black  America '  which  the  author  of  this  work  has  not 
thought  fit  to  mention  in  the  body  of  his  '  Lone-Star  of 
Liberia.' 


XX  PREFACE. 

He  tells  us,  for  instance,  that  the  white,  or  rather  he 
(Laird  Clowes)  is  of  opinion  that  the  African  '  more  nearly 
approaches  the  quadrumana  than  does  any  other  member 
of  the  human  family ;  .  .  .  (and  that)  his  (the  African's) 
arms  are,  on  an  average,  two  inches  longer  than  his  (Laird 
Clowes's).'  This  is  the  white  man's,  or,  to  be  more  correct, 
Laird  Clowes's,  opinion.  It  is  an  opinion  as  false  as  it  is 
foolish.  It  is  an  opinion  derived  from  the  mere  ipse  dixit — 
the  mere  assertion  of  the  erratic  Charles  Robert  Darwin. 
At  the  same  time  Laird  Clowes  is  forgetful  of  the  fact  that 
the  African  has  an  opinion  of  his  own,  and  that  he  (the 
African)  does  not  entertain  and  admit  for  one  moment  such 
an  absurd  and  preposterous  notion  or  opinion. 

W.  Laird  Clowes  proceeds  to  say  that  he,  as  a  white 
man,  is  of  opinion  that  the  African's  '  facial  angle  is  about 
70  degrees,  while  his  is  about  82  degrees';  that  'the 
average  weight  of  his  (the  African's)  brain  is  ten  ounces 
less  than  that  of  people  of  his  (Laird  Clowes's)'Own  family'; 
that  the  African  has  '  high  and  prominent  cheek-bones ' ; 
that  'his  (the  African's)  cranium  is  much  thicker  than 
Laird  Clowes's ' ;  that  '  his  (the  African's)  head  is  covered 
not  with  hair,  but  with  wool  of  nearly  flat  section  ' ;  that 
the  African's  '  skin  is  thicker  than  W.  Laird  Clowes's,  and 
that  it  is  velvety  and  emits  a  characteristic  odour,'  unlike 
that  of  Laird  Clowes,  which  is  perfection ;  that  '  his  (the 
African's)  frame,  owing  to  structural  peculiarities,  is  not  as 
erect  as  W.  Laird  Clowes,  the  Times  Commissioner's  ;  that 
'  the  cranial  sutures  of  the  Negro  close  up  much  earlier 
than  those  of  W.  Laird  Clowes.' 

The  reader  will  have  observed  that  these  are  all  the 
peculiar  and  preposterous  notions  of  W.  Laird  Clowes, 
who  believes  that  he  is  perfection  itself,  and  that  the  African 
'  is  everything  that  is  horrid.'  How  comes  W.  Laird 
Clowes  to   know  that   the  African's   facial  angle  is  about 


PREFACE.  xxi 

70  degrees,  while  his  (Laird  Clowes's)  is  about  82  degrees — 
that  the  average  weight  of  the  African's  brain  is  ten  ounces 
less  than  that  of  his  (Laird  Clowes's) — that  the  African's 
cranium  and  skin  are  much  thicker  than  those  of  W.  Laird 
Clowes — that  the  cranial  sutures  of  the  African  close  up 
much  earlier  than  those  of  Laird  Clowes?  Whence  did 
he  derive  these  preposterous  notions?  Are  these  things 
so  because  W.  Laird  Clowes,  big  with  importance  and 
indulging  in  tall  talk,  would  fain  make  them  so? 

The  Caucasian  must  not  try  to  lay  down  the  law  to  the 
African,  and  force  him  to  believe  that  he  is  this  while  he 
is  that,  or  that  he  is  that  while  he  is  this. 

Caucasians  know,  or  ought  to  know,  what  their  own 
race  is  like;  while  we  Africans  know  better  than  non- 
Africans  what  we  are,  and  what  we  are  not,  like.  Mr.  W. 
Laird  Clowes  has  an  opinion,  but  the  African  has  and  can 
form  another  opinion. 

And  I  add  that  it  is  preposterous  and  erroneous  for  the 
white  man  to  suppose  that  the  intelligent,  self-reliant,  and 
last,  not  least,  self-respecting  African  will  accept  any 
doctrine  as  to  his  moral,  mental  and  other  peculiarities 
and  capacities  as  he  (the  white  man)  lays  it  down  and 
interprets,  when  it  is  to  the  disadvantage  and  detriment  of 
the  African. 

F.  A.  D. 

Lincoln's  Inn  Library, 
London,  W.C. 


CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER  l-AGE 

I.       THE   AFRICO-AMERICAN          -                 -                 -                 -  -  I 

II.      IS  THE   ETHIOPIAN   INFERIOR  TO  THE    CAUCASIAN  ?  -  28 

III.       IMMORALITY                 -                 -                 -                 -                 -  -  76 

IV.      SUPERSTITION    IN   THE   NINETEENTH   CENTURY      -  -  1 37 

V.       UNDER   CAUCASIAN    RULE    -                 -                 -                 -  "  -  180 

VI.       AFRICA   GOVERNED    BY   AFRICANS    ....  222 

VII.       REPATRIATION    AND   LIBERIA              .                 -                 -  -  24O 


THE  LONE-STAR  OE  LIBERIA, 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE    AFRICO-AMERICAN. 

Commissioned  by  the  Ti??tes  of  London,  Mr  W.  Laird 
Clowes  (as  he  tells  us  in  his  introduction  to  'Black 
America')  betook  himself,  in  the  autumn  of  1890,  to  the 
eight  late  Slave-holding  States  in  the  Southern  portion  of 
the  United  States  of  America,  for  the  purpose  of  studying 
the  condition  of  the  '  ex-slave ' — or,  in  other  words,  the 
*  Africo- American ' — and  his  relations  towards  his  white 
neighbours.  And  he  further  says  that  he  gives  '  an  impartial 
review,  not  only  of  the  present  aspects,  but  also  of  the 
past  history,  of  the  complex  problem  which  has  thus  been 
created.'  We  have  given  his  work  ('  Black  America  ')  our 
careful  attention,  and  we  have  set  it  down  with  that  legiti- 
mate feeling  of  indignation  which  all  good  and  true  Africans, 
who  have  the  welfare  of  their  race  at  heart,  must  feel  when 
they  hear  of  the  calumnies — base,  false,  and  therefore  un- 
justifiable— which  are  again  and  again  heaped  upon  the 
devoted  heads  of  the  unfortunate,  down-trodden,  and  long- 
suffering  members  of  the  African  race  in  America,  West 
Indies,  and  elsewhere,  by  prejudiced  Caucasians  such  as  Sir 


2  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Spencer  St.  John,  James  Anthony  Froude,  James  Bryce,  Man- 
ville  Fenn,  Henry  M.  Stanley  (who  slaughtered  many  of  the 
Africans  in  Central  and  East  Africa)  and  W.  Laird  Clowes. 
As  Mr.  Clowes  had  been  commissioned  by  the  Times,  it 
is  not  only  possible,  but  also  probable,  that  he  threw  him- 
self into  the  arms  of  the  Conservative  Democrats  of  the 
Southern  States,  and  asked  them  for  particulars,  and  for 
their  opinion  of  the  Africo- Americans,  the  vast  majority  of 
whom  are  Liberal  Republicans.  Can  we,  then,  expect  to 
have  an  *  impartial  review,  not  only  of  the  present  aspects 
but  also  of  the  past  history,  of  the  problem  which  has  thus 
been  created,'  at  the  hands  of  the  White  Democrat-Con- 
servatives, who  are  politically  out  of  sympathy  with  their 
Ethiopian  neighbours  ?  All  the  world  knows  well  how  strong 
is  the  race  hatred  and  prejudice  that  exists  in  the  Southern 
portion  of  the  United  States. 

Happily,  however,  only  a  very  few  of  the  British  people 
are  likely  to  endorse  the  malignant  opinions  and  reports  of 
Mr.  Clowes,  so  far  as  they  affect  the  African.  It  would 
seem  that  Laird  Clowes  has  been  following  in  the  wake 
of  James  Anthony  Froude  and  others  of  his  school,  and 
especially  the  traveller  Stanley,  who  delights  in  seeing  the 
Africans  kept  under  as  much  as  possible. 

After  going  through  some  eighteen  pages  of  more  or  less 
unimportant  matter  in  'Black  America,'  we  come  to  the 
so-called  *  Reconstruction '  period  in  the  eight  old  Slave- 
holding  States  in  the  Union.  It  would  be  superfluous  for 
us,  here  or  anywhere  else,  to  dwell  for  a  moment  on  the 
events  and  doings  of  that  period,  because  Mr.  Clowes  has 
been  both  kind  and  imprudent  in  informing  us  that  all  the 
particulars  concerning  the  doings  of  that  time  have  been 
furnished  him  by  Messrs.  Hilary  A.  Herbert,  Zebulon  B. 
Vance,  John  H.  Hemphill,  Henry  J.  Turner,  Samuel  Pasco, 
Robert  Stiles,  Ethelbert  Burksdale  and  B.  J.  Sage,  all,  pre- 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  3 

sumably,  Southern  Democrat-Conservatives,  imbued  with 
prejudices  and  hatred  of  the  African  which  border  closely 
on  childishness.  When  W.  Laird  Clowes  gravely  tells  us 
that  such  White  Conservative-Democrats  as  H.  A.  Herbert, 
Z.  B.  Vance,  J.  H.  Hemphill  and  Co.  (even  supposing  that 
they  did  not  hate  the  African)  have  been  his  informants  as 
to  the  alleged  *'  excesses '  said  to  have  been  committed  by 
the  Liberal-Republican  Africans  of  the  South  during  the 
*  Reconstruction '  period,  are  we  not  justified  in  asking 
whether  we  can  ever  hope  to  receive  at  the  hands  of  the 
British  Conservative  Party  any  good  testimonials  and  favour- 
able reports  respecting  the  Irish  Parliamentary  Party,  even 
though  the  former  may  not  entertain  the  slightest  hatred 
and  ill-will  towards  the  latter  ? 

As  the  American  Africans  are  blacky  and  were  slaves^  and 
as  they  are  now  freemen,  and  as  they  are,  almost  unani- 
mously, Republican-Liberals,  what  man — what  impartial  man 
— is  there  who  can  ever  hope  that  considerate  and  favourable 
reports  can  be  received  at  the  hands  of  political  opponents, 
White  Conservative-Democrats,  such  as  Herbert,  Vance, 
Hemphill,  Turner,  Pasco,  Stiles,  Burksdale  and  Sage?  Is 
it  at  all  probable  that  trustworthy  reports  of  a  party  and  a  race 
like  the  Liberal-Republican  African  Party  can  ever  be  forth- 
coming from  its  opponents,  when  there  is  so  much  racial 
and  party  prejudice?  But  what  is  even  more  to  be  regretted 
is,  that  this  blinding  race-prejudice  is  not  merely  confined 
to  the  men.  The  fair  sex,  however,  are  often,  we  admit,  as 
they  ought  to  be  always,  gentle  and  pitiful.  White  women 
do,  throughout  America,  intermarry  with  blacks,  in  spite  of 
what  Mr.  Clowes  may  say  to  the  contrary. 

Apart  from  the  fact  that  Mr.  Clowes  is  probably  himself 
a  Conservative,  it  is  on  record,  and  a  matter  of  history,  that 
any  '  irregularities,'  not  '  excesses,'  which  were  committed 
during  the   'Reconstruction'   period  were   committed   by 

1 — 2 


4  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  White  Republican-Liberals ;  and  the  responsibility  and 
blame  consequently  must  lie,  not  at  the  doors  of  the 
American  Africans  of  Liberal-Republican  tendencies,  but 
at  the  doors  of  the  White  Liberal-Republicans. 

Mr.  Clowes  goes  on  to  say,  amongst  other  things,  in 
chap,  ii.,  p.  ^(i^  of  '  Black  America,'  that  '  there  is  or  may 
be  danger  in  the  fact  that  the  Negro  as  a  citizen  does  not 
get  all  that  to  which  he  is  legally  entitled.  How  he  is  de- 
prived of  very  much  that  the  law  affects  to  give  him  will  be 
the  subject  of  the  next  chapter.'  And  in  the  next  chapter 
(iii.)  Laird  Clowes,  on  page  75,  says,  'The  attitude  of  the 
Southern  white  towards  the  Negro  is,  nevertheless,  not 
exactly  an  unkind  one.  It  is  rather  that  of  a  magisterial 
guardian.' 

The  impartial  will  at  once  have  noticed  the  inconsistencies 
which  exist  between  the  allegations  on  page  66,  chap,  ii., 
and  those  on  page  75,  chap.  iii. 

Why  does  not  Laird  Clowes  say  at  once  what  he  means, 
and  what  he  would  like  us  to  understand  ?  Why  does  he 
not  frankly  admit,  without  hesitation,  and  beating  about 
the  bush,  that  the  American  African  is  shamelessly  and  dis- 
gracefully cheated  of  the  rights  and  privileges  conferred 
upon  him  by  Amendments  xiii.,  xiv.,  and  xv.  to  the  Consti- 
tution of  the  United  States  of  America  ? 

Though  the  author  of  '  Black  America  '  tells  us  that  '  the 
attitude  of  the  Southern  white  towards  the  Negro  is  that  of 
a  magisterial  guardian,'  he  deliberately  proceeds  to  con- 
tradict himself  in  substance  by  practically  admitting, 
willingly  or  unwillingly,  on  pages  94,  95,  96,  97  and  else 
where,  in  effect,  that  '  the  attitude  of  the  Southern  white 
towards  the  Negro '  is  not  '  that  of  a  magisterial  guardian 
inasmuch  as  he  quotes,  and  verbatim,  the  Washington 
correspondence  of  the  Pittsburg  Dispatch  of  January  nth, 
1890,  which  runs  as  follows  :  *  It  is  impossible  for  the  Negro^ 


) 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  5 

to  get  any  justice  at  the  hands  of  Southern  magistrates 
or  juries.  A  man  who  resides  in  Augusta,  Georgia — a 
Democrat  and  a  hater  of  the  Negro — admits  that  the  whites' 
maltreatment  of  the  blacks  must  one  day  recoil  upon  their 
own  heads.  "Why,"  said  he  to  me  to-day,  "you  can't 
convict  a  white  man  of  the  murder  of  a  Negro,  nor  even  of 
a  white  friend  of  the  Negro.  Just  before  I  left  home  a 
Negro  was  found  one  morning  in  the  street  with  his  body 
riddled  with  bullets.  I  was  pretty  certain  that  his  death 
was  due  to  a  certain  gang  of  roughs,  whose  leader  is  under 
obligation  to  me  for  keeping  him  out  of  the  penitentiary. 
Meeting  him,  I  said,  "  Pat,  who  killed  that  nigger  ?" — "  Oh, 
some  of  the  boys,"  said  Pat,  with  a  grin. — "  What  did  they  do 
it  for  ?"  I  asked. — "  Oh,  because  he  was  a  nigger,"  said  Pat. 
"And,"  he  continued,  "he  was  the  best  nigger  in  town. 
Why,  he  would  even  take  off  his  hat  to  me."  I  thought  he 
must  be  a  good  Negro  indeed  who  would  take  off  his  hat 
to  that  creature,  and  I  walked  away  pondering  upon  what 
must  be  the  outcome  of  it  all.  It  is  my  opinion  that  several 
of  the  Southern  States  will  have  to  be  abandoned  to  the 
Negroes  if  we  would  avoid  terrible  consequences  from  the 
wrongs  we  are  heaping  on  them.' 

We  ask  Laird  Clowes,  or  anyone  else  of  his  following, 
whether  that  attitude  of  the  Southern  white  towards  the 
African — as  instanced  in  the  murder  recorded  above — is 
that  of  a  '  magisterial  guardian '  and  'not  exactly  an  unkind 
one'? 

Where  is  '  magisterial  guardianship '  of  the  African  by  the 
Southern  white  when  '  it  is  impossible  for  the  Negro  to  get 
any  justice  at  the  hands  of  Southern  magistrates  or 
juries  /  when  even  '  a  Democrat  and  a  hater  of  the  Negro,' 
avowedly  admitted  that  one  '  cannot  convict  a  white  man  of 
the  murder  of  a  Negro,  nor  even  of  a  white  friend  of  the 
Negro '? 


6  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

The  following  summary  from  a  Barnwell  letter  of 
January  nth,  1890,  in  the  Charleston  Budget  of  that  year 
and  month,  as  given  by  Laird  Clowes,  shows  that  'A 
Negro  named  William  Black  stole  some  trifling  articles  from 
the  house  of  a  white  man,  one  Jim  Bennett,  near  Robins, 
South  Carolina.  Bennett  followed  and  caught  the  negro 
and,  assisted  by  Dave  Ready,  Henry  Sweat,  and  John 
Walker,  tied  the  prisoner  to  a  tree.  Ready  then  placed  a 
gun  to  the  Negro's  temple  and  blew  out  the  man's  brains. 
Bennett,  Walker,  and  Sweat  were  arrested  as  accessories  in 
the  first  degree,  but  were  discharged  by  Justice  Dunbar. 
Ready  apparently  escaped.'  Now,  is  that  a  fair  specimen  of 
Anglo-Saxon  civilization  and  humanity,  as  well  as  a  fair 
specimen  of  the  '  magisterial  guardianship  '  of  the  African  by 
the  Southern  white  of  the  United  States  ?  Because  the 
African,  William  Black,  '  stole  some  trifling  articles  from  the 
house  of  a  white  man,'  he  was  set  upon  by  four  men  and 
murdered  in  cold  blood.  In  any  truly  civilized  and 
Christian  country  the  murderers  would  not  have  escaped. 
William  Black,  it  is  true,  committed  an  offence  by  stealing 
'  some  trifling  articles,'  it  would  seem,  '  from  the  house  of  a 
white  man.'  Then  he  ought  to  have  been  tried  by  the  laws 
of  the  land ;  but  a  man's  valuable  life  ought  not  to  have 
been  taken  away  in  this  lawless  manner.  Such  barbarities 
can  only  be  met  with  in  uncivilized  countries,  and  are 
equalled  only  by  the  excesses  committed  by  Henry  M. 
Stanley  in  Central  Africa.  Black's  offence  was  what  lawyers 
call  simple  'larceny,'  and  had  he  been  properly  tried  and 
found  guilty,  he  would  only  have  been  given  a  term  of  im- 
prisonment, which  might  have  exercised  a  beneficial  in- 
fluence on  him  and  brought  about  his  reform ;  but  his 
murder  by  four  scoundrels,  who  succeeded  in  evading 
justice,  put  an  end  to  everything,  and  substituted  injustice 


THE  AFRI CO- AMERICAN.  7 

for  justice — injustice  aggravated  when  these  murderers  suc- 
ceeded in  evading  punishment. 

Laird  Clowes  furnishes  us  with  more  arguments,  or, 
rather,  evidences,  which  are  like  so  many  scourges  to  his 
own  back,  because  they  prove  that  '  the  attitude  of  the 
Southern  white  towards  the  Negro '  is  not  '  that  of  a 
magisterial  guardian.'  He  gives  a  summary  of  a  despatch 
from  Augusta,  Georgia,  dated  October  24th,  1890  (see 
Charleston  News  and  Courier)^  in  which  it  is  said  :  '  Two 
boys — Williams,  a  Negro,  and  Robertson,  a  white — were 
playing  together  near  Waynesborough  with  a  gun,  which, 
being  accidentally  discharged,  killed  Robertson.  The 
Negro  boy  was  arrested,  but  was  taken  from  custody  by  a 
mob  of  white  men,  who  tied  him  up  and  shot  him  to  death.' 
Is  that  felonious  act  a  specimen  of  the  '  magisterial  guardian- 
ship' of  the  African  by  the  Southern  white?  The  poor 
African  boy  was  brutally  murdered  for  an  act  which  was  the 
result  of  accident.  In  any  civilized  and  Christian  country 
the  unhappy  and  unfortunate  boy,  after  a  trial,  would  have 
been  acquitted  ;  but  in  America  things  are  done  differently. 
And  yet  Laird  Clowes  tells  us  that  '  the  attitude  of  the 
Southern  white  towards  the  Negro '  is  '  that  of  a  magisterial 
guardian.'  Perhaps  those  brutal  outrages  are,  in  Laird 
Clowes's  sight,  acts  of  '  magisterial  guardianship.'  We 
referred  to  the  boy  Williams  as  *  poor,'  *  unhappy,'  and  *  un- 
fortunate ' ;  but  he  is  neither  now :  he  is  in  a  better  land, 
where  no  difference  is  made  between  the  dark  skin  and  the 
pale  face. 

Is  the  following  account  which  Laird  Clowes  has  culled 
from  the  Boston  Advertiser  of  June  2nd,  1889,  also  a 
specimen  of  white  man's  magisterial  guardianship  ? — *  The 
report  comes  from  South  Carolina  that  a  coloured  man, 
unarmed  and  defenceless,  fell  into  an  altercation  with  a 
white  man  of  that  State  named  Gallman,     Gallman  slit  the 


8  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

coloured  man's  throat  from  ear  to  ear,  and  drove  to  a 
neighbour's  house,  where  he  procured  a  shot-gun,  and 
emptied  the  contents  of  one  barrel  into  the  wounded  man. 
At  a  late  hour  that  night  Gallman's  friends,  hearing  that  the 
victim  had  not  died,  although  he  was  at  death's  door,  rode 
to  where  he  lay,  and  carried  him  to  the  nearest  churchyard, 
where  they  riddled  his  body  with  bullets.'  In  this  case  the 
victim  was  unarmed  and  defenceless.  We  reproduce 
another  quotation  from  '  Black  America.'  Clowes  takes  it 
from  the  Greenville  News  of  September  loth,  1889:  'In 
Fulton  County,  Georgia,  a  black  boy,  of  eighteen  years,  was 
taken  from  gaol  and  hanged  for  "assaulting"  a  white  girl, 
the  assault  consisting  of  catching  the  child  by  the  arms  and 
running  away,  when  she  and  her  companions  screamed. 
Then  a  pack  of  white  ruffians,  heavily  armed,  went  from  one 
cabin  to  another  in  an  alleged  search  for  the  criminal,  and 
barbarously  whipped  and  maltreated  inoffensive  Negroes^ 
who  were  powerless  to  defend  themselves  against  shot-guns 
and  revolvers  presented  at  their  heads.' 

These  are  murders  and  other  outrages  committed  on  un- 
armed and  defenceless  Africans,  They  are  the  evidences 
of  '  magisterial  guardianship  '  towards  the  Ethiopian  only  too 
truly.  Britishers  hold  Guildhall  meetings  to  protest  against 
inhuman  treatment  of  Jews  by  the  Russian  Government, 
but  they  sit  apathetic,  listless  and  unmoved,  though  they 
hear  the  groans  of  Christians  (who  happen  to  be  black)  like 
themselves,  who  have  innumerable  claims  on  their  sympathy 
by  reason  of  their  having  been  torn  away  from  their  Father- 
land, and  held  for  generations  in  dehumanizing  bondage. 
Has  the  Lord  Mayor  of  London  sent  a  memorial  to  the 
President  of  the  United  States  to  protest  against  the 
'  American-African  Horrors  '  daily  perpetrated  in  America  ? 

The  Anglo-Saxons — who  to-day  pride  themselves  on  the 
fact  that  their  ancestors  handed  down  to  them  that  great 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  9 

bulwark  of  liberty,  '  Magna  Charta,'  the  grant  of  which  was 
wrenched  from  the  hands  of  tyrannical  and  unwilling  John 
at  Runnymede — now  deny  to  the  members  of  an  unfortu- 
nate and  downtrodden  race  the  privileges  and  blessings  of 
that  Great  Charter.  What  laws,  we  ask,  protect  the  personal 
liberty  and  property  of  the  Africans  in  America?  Laird 
Clowes  will  answer  that  question.  For  he  quotes  an  ex- 
tract from  the  '  Augusta  (Georgia)  Chronicle '  of  January  5th, 
1890,  which  says:  'Laws  are  powerless  either  to  prevent 
the  commission  of  crime  or  to  punish  the  criminals,  unless 
public  sentiment  forbids  the  one  and  commands  the  other. 
Where  there  is  little  regard  for  human  life — and  we  fear 
this  is  the  case  in  many  portions  of  our  country — the  courts 
are  often  to  blame  for  not  hanging  those  who  slay  their 
fellow-men.  Is  it  not  a  fact  that  it  is  almost  impossible  to 
convict  a  man  of  the  crime  of  murder  who  has  any  social 
position  or  means  to  defend  himself?  If  a  Negro  kills  a 
white  man  he  is  pretty  sure  either  to  be  lynched  or  hung. 
But  if  a  white  man  slays  a  Negro  he  is  in  no  danger  of 
being  lynched,  and  as  to  his  being  hung  for  the  crime, 
there  is  not  much  probability.'  And  this  frank  confession 
comes  from  a  journal  of  the  South,  which  is  edited  by  a 
white  Conservative-Democrat ! 

The  British  people  stand  aghast  at  the  tales  of  the 
Siberian  horrors,  which  are  from  time  to  time  drifted  to 
their  shores,  and  demonstrative  meetings  are  held  to  devise 
the  best  possible  means  for  bearding  the  Russian  bear.  But 
those  blood-curdling  horrors  of  daily  occurrence  in  America, 
and  which  are  always  directed  against  the  Ethiopians,  are 
thought  nothing  of.  Africans  are  constantly  murdered  by 
bloodthirsty  mobs.  Does  the  British  Press  ever  say  any- 
thing about  these  things  ?  The  Jews  and  the  Poles  are 
undoubtedly  more  fortunate  than  the  African  race.  The 
African  is  forgotten.      But  will    he  always   be  forgotten? 


lo  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

We  think  not.  It  is  on  record  that  out  of  io8  persons 
lynched  in  the  United  States  of  America  during  the  year 
1890,  fully  90  were  Africans,  and — oh,  horror  ! — one  was  an 
Ethiopian  woman.  And  yet  Mr.  Clowes  tells  us  that  the 
attitude  of  the  Southern  white  towards  the  African  is  never- 
theless '  not  an  unkind  one.'  It  is  rather  that  of  a  '  magis- 
terial guardian.'  Perhaps  we  do  not  quite  understand  what 
'magisterial  guardianship'  is.  We  certainly  do  not  if  the 
blood  -  curdling  murders  committed  by  ruffianly  White 
Americans  on  their  Black  compatriots,  and  their  equals  de 
jure^  in  the  United  States,  form  one  of  the  component  parts 
of  '  magisterial  guardianship '  ! 

Mr.  Clowes,  on  page  11  (and  we  ask  the  reader  to  take  a 
glance  at  page  11  of  '  Black  America '),  says  that  the  Black 
Americans  '  have  at  present  no  strong  ambitions  and  very 
few  wants ' ;  but  yet,  with  characteristic  inconsistency,  on 
page  90,  in  '  Black  America,'  he  admits  that  *  on  the  side 
of  the  Negro  there  is  a  desire  to  be  what  the  white 
man  is,  and  to  do  what  the  white  man  does — to  elevate 
himself  to  the  same  level  of  privileges.'  If  this  be  so,  the-n 
the  African  evidently  has  '  strong  ambitions  and  very  great 
wants,'  and  Mr.  Clowes  is  inconsistent  with  himself. 

Speaking  of  the  fair  sex  of  the  Sunny  South,  Laird  Clowes 
gives  it  as  his  opinion,  that  the  Southern  white  women 
entertain  a  general  aversion  towards  intermarriage  with  the 
American  Africans.  We  are  not  going  to  deny  that  there 
may  be  some  who  do.  But  only  a  few  are  found  who  can 
be  so  narrow-minded.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  the  great 
majority  of  the  fair  sex  among  the  Southern  whites  are  not 
averse  towards  intermarriage  with  the  Africans.  This  is 
the  truth  even  concerning  the  prejudiced  Sunny  South  ! 

As  Laird  Clowes  seems  to  know  so  much  about  Mr. 
Frederick  Douglass,  he  ought  to  be  aware  that  the  American 
Minister   to    Hayti,  and  the   acknowledged  leader   of  all 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  ii 

Africans  living  under  European  and  American  flags,  is 
joined  in  the  bonds  of  wedlock  with  a  Southern  white 
woman,  a  '  belle  '  of  the  Sunny  South. 

We,  as  much  as  anyone  else,  deprecate  all  so-called 
assaults  alleged  to  be  committed  on  the  Southern  white 
women  from  time  to  time  by  Africans  of  too  amorous  and 
affectionate  a  temperament.  The  'assaults'  committed  by 
the  American  Africans  on  the  Southern  white  women  are  as 
a  rule  petty,  and  can  hardly  be  called  assaults.  Whilst  we 
do  not  approve  of  the  conduct  of  the  few  among  our  kins- 
men and  countrymen  in  America  who  now  and  again 
commit  so-called  '  assaults '  on  women,  by  allowing  their 
too  affectionate  dispositions  to  get  the  better  of  them,  we 
offer  our  firm  and  unqualified  protest  against  the  daily 
murders,  euphemistically  termed  lynchings,  of  the  Africans 
by  the  whites  which  follow  these  '  assaults '  by  the  Ethiopians 
on  the  white  women.  It  is  our  opinion  that  if  our  kinsmen 
and  countrymen  do  commit  real  and  serious  assaults  on 
the  white  women  in  the  United  States,  those  assaults  are 
the  offspring  of  powerful  reasoning,  and  we  think  they 
reason  in  this  way  :  '  Whereas  we  American  Africans 
cannot  get  justice,  and  have  no  voice  in  the  South,  and 
cannot  get  our  grievances  redressed  at  the  hands  of  the 
white  magistrates  and  juries  against  our  oppressors,  be  it 
resolved  that  those  of  us  American  Africans  who  can  do 
and  dare,  and  have  sufficient  courage  to  perform  achieve- 
ments of  "  derring  do,"  retaliate  on  those  on  whom  we  can 
retaliate,  and  so  attract  notice  and  get  our  grievances 
righted.'  It  is  the  privilege  of  the  weak — the  grim  resolve 
of  despair. 

We  certainly  discountenance  all  such  thoughts  ;  yet,  at 
the  same  time,  we  cannot  but  think  how  many  Americans 
of  colour,  both  women  and  children,  have  been  barbarously 
outraged   and   murdered,   and   even   burnt   alive,   by   the 


12  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

whites  ;  and  these  things  have  been  done  with  little  or  no 
cause.  But  if  the  Africans  do  afford  sufficient  occasion  for 
the  resentment  of  the  Whites  by  violating  the  social  laws, 
then  by  all  means  let  the  law  take  its  ordinary  course  with 
them.  But  mob-Xn-w  is  the  rule  in  America ;  the  law  of  the 
land  is  the  exception  when  the  Africans  are  concerned. 

Here  are  two  of  many  instances  of  Africo-Americans 
being  burnt  alive :  '  Louisville,  Kentucky,  September  2nd, 
1889. — The  Courier  Journal  has  a  special  from  Somerset, 
Kentucky,  which  states  that  news  has  reached  there  of  a 
brutal  outrage  committed  upon  the  twelve-year-old  daughter 
of  William  Oates,  a  prominent  and  wealthy  farmer  residing 
a  few  miles  from  Montecello.  Mr.  Oates  has  two  daughters, 
aged  respectively  twelve  and  fourteen  years.  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Oates  left  home  on  business,  and  left  the  two  young  girls 
in  charge  of  the  house.  Mr.  Oates  had  in  his  employ  a 
Negro  boy  about  grown.  Knowing  that  the  old  folks  were 
away,  he  entered  the  house,  and,  after  locking  the  door 
upon  the  two  girls,  assaulted  the  younger.  The  elder  girl 
escaped  from  the  room,  and,  going  to  a  neighbour's  house, 
gave  the  alarm.  A  posse  was  organized  and  started  in  pur- 
suit. The  Negro  was  caught  in  the  woods  and  tied  to  a 
stake.  A  rail-pen  was  then  built  around  him,  coal  oil  was 
poured  over  him  and  upon  the  rails,  matches  were  applied, 
and  the  Negro  was  burnt  to  death.'  The  above  appears  on 
pages  132  and  133  in  'Black  America.'  The  murder  of  an 
Africo-American  boy  by  burning,  because  he  happened  to 
have  been  too  passionately  inclined  towards  the  young  girl 
Oates,  was,  to  say  the  least,  brutal,  outrageous  and  unjusti- 
fiable. Where  was  the  law  of  the  land?  Why  did  it  not 
intervene  if  the  unfortunate  African  boy  was  guilty  ?  When 
that  murder  was  committed  in  the  United  States,  did  we  read 
of  *  American  Persecution '  or  '  Persecution  of  the  Africans,' 
as    we    are    now  reading  '  Russian  Persecution '  or  '  Per- 


THE  AFRICO'AMERICAN.  13 

secution  of  the  Jews,'  in  the  British  daily  press?  Oh 
no  !  we  never  do.  Says  the  Caucasian,  We  must  keep  the 
Ethiopian  down.  If  that  be  not  so,  where  was  the  influential 
and  largely  attended  Guildhall  meeting  on  behalf  of  the 
Africans?  Did  the  Lord  Mayor  and  the  Earl  of  Meath 
send  a  petition  to  the  President  of  the  United  States  to 
protest  against  the  '  American  African  Horrors '  perpetrated 
by  the  White  Americans  ?  Did  the  Right  Honourable  W. 
E.  Gladstone  write  a  pamphlet  entitled  '  American  African 
Horrors,'  as  well  as  his  '  Bulgarian  Horrors  '  ? 

When   the  '  Commander  of  the  Faithful ' — the  Turkish 
Sovereign — and  his  Government  some  years  ago  barbarously 
butchered  a  number  of  Christians,  all  Europe  from  one  end 
to  the  other  raised  a  loud  cry,  and  intervened  between  the 
Porte  and  her  Christian  subjects.      But  where  are  those 
who   intervene  on  behalf  of  the  dark-skinned  American? 
You  British  people  who  snatched  us  from  our  native  land 
and  from  our  fathers'  homes,  and  carried  us  to  America  and 
to  the  West  India  Islands  against  our  will,  we  ask  you  to 
take  us  back — to  give  us  money  to  return  to  the  land  of 
our  fathers,  where  we  can  be  free  and  independent,  and 
where  we   can  govern   ourselves.     One  day  (who  knows  ?) 
you  may  find  that  you  have  to  reap  the  whirlwind  of  the 
wind  which   you    are    now  sowing  !     We  are  justified    in 
saying  this,   because   it    is  admitted  on  all  sides  that  we 
Africans  are  a  prolific  race,  and  many  times  more  prolific 
than   the  Caucasian  race  ;    and  consequently  one  day  we 
may  be  in  a  position  to  avenge  the  shameful  wrongs  that 
are  being  inflicted  upon  us  now.     It  ought  to  be  remem- 
bered that  we  are  but  mortals,  and  even  good  old  Job  him- 
self, with  all  his  patience,  were  he  alive  to-day  and  sub- 
jected, together  with  his  people,  to  the  outrages  which  the 
African  is  to-day  receiving  at  the  hands  of  his  White  com- 
patriots, would  lose  his  world-wide  reputation  for  patience. 


14  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

and  would  surely  resent  the  wrongs  inflicted  on  him  and 
his. 

Here  is  another  instance  of  an  African  being  burnt  to  death; 
it  is  a  man  this  time  who  suffers.  Dalziel's  Agency,  dated 
New  Orleans,  May  31st,  1891,  telegraphing  to  the  London 
Daily  T'^/*?^/'^//^,  of  Monday,  June  ist,  1891,  says:  'The 
details  of  a  sensational  lynching  case  have  just  transpired, 
an  official  report  of  the  matter  having  been  forwarded  to 
the  Governor  by  the  authorities  of  the  Claiborne  parish. 
The  victim  was  a  Negro  tramp  named  Hampton.  He  was 
suspected  of  stealing  pigs  from  the  parish,  and  a  warrant 
was  issued  for  his  arrest.  In  the  attempt  to  take  him 
Hampton  shot  a  farmer  dead.  He  was,  however,  arrested, 
but  on  being  tried  for  murder  was  acquitted;  he  was  then 
put  on  his  trial  for  stealing,  and  being  convicted,  was 
sentenced  to  a  year's  imprisonment.  The  friends  of  the 
farmer  whom  he  had  killed  took  an  oath  that  they  would 
revenge  his  death  upon  the  Negro  as  soon  as  his  time  ex- 
pired. Hampton  was  released  from  prison  on  May  20th,  and 
as  soon  as  he  walked  out  of  gaol  was  seized  by  a  number  of 
men  and  handcuffed.  He  was  then  taken  to  a  forest  in  the 
vicinity  of  the  town,  tied  to  a  stake,  and  burned  to  death. 
The  authoritiesHiave  found  no  traces  of  the  man  except  his 
ashes  and  the  manacles  by  which  he  was  secured.' 

Comment,  we  think,  is  unnecessary.  Such  a  brutal 
murder  is  simply  a  crying  shame.  There  is  no  white  woman 
at  the  bottom  of  it  this  time. 

But  why  is  it  that  to-day,  in  the  prejudiced  Sunny  South, 
Africans  are  murdered  more  for  '  assaulting  '  white  women 
than  for  other  sorts  of  offences  ?  We  answer  with  one  of 
the  numbers  of  the  Montgomery  Herald,  for  August,  1887  : 
'Why  is  it  that  white  women  attract  Africans  more  than 
in  former  days  ?  There  was  a  time  when  such  a  thing  was 
unheard  of.     There  is  a  secret  to  this  thing,  and  we  greaily 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  15 

suspect  it  is  the  growing  appreciation  of  the  white  Juliet  for 
the  Ethiopian  Romeo  as  he  becomes  more  and  more  inteUi- 
gent  and  refined.  If  something  is  not  done  to  break  up 
these  lynchings  it  will  be  so  that  after  awhile  they  will 
lynch  every  African  that  looks  at  a  white  woman  with 
a  twinkle  in  his  eye.'  Just  so.  Laird  Clowes,  however, 
sees  the  situation  with  different  eyes,  and  calls  that  article 
'  brutal.'  But  we  think  otherwise,  and  see  no  '  brutality  '  in 
the  article  of  the  Montgomery  Herald.  On  the  contrary, 
we  think  that  it  reflects  the  opinions  of  all  good  and  true 
Africans  all  the  world  over. 

There  is  one  panacea,  however,  for  all  these  lynching 
evils  which  exist  in  the  United  States  wherever  there  are 
Africans,  and  that  panacea  is  the  universal  cure  of  wholesale 
Emigration^  which  must  carry  with  it  as  its  almost  inevitable 
consequences  (i)  Repatriation  and  (2)  Independence  in 
Africa,  our  Fatherland.  We  do  not  propose,  however,  to 
dwell  at  length  on  that  panacea  here. 

Laird  Clowes  commits  a  great  blunder  when  he  asserts, 
on  page  176,  that:  '  Mulattoes  intermarry,  and,  in  some 
cases,  have  intermarried  for  generations.  In  more  than  one 
place  in  the  South  they,  with  occasional  admixtures  of 
Quadroons,  constitute  a  small,  distinct  *  community  of 
highly  respectable  people,  living  to  themselves  for  the  most 
part,  and  having  as  little  in  common  with  their  black  as 
with  their  white  neighbours ;  for  white  blood,  even  in  small 
quantities,  "  tells,"  and  the  pride  of  the  Mulatto  or 
Quadroon,  as  a  rule,  rebels  as  much  at  the  idea  of  alliance 
with  the  Negro,  as  does  the  pride  of  the  white  at  the  idea 
of  alliance  with  coloured  or  black.'  And,  says  this  Com- 
missioner of  the  Times,  in  another  page  (178):  *In  the 
coloured  man,  again,  we  find  the  natural  leader  of  the 
Negro  in  all  movements,  political,  religious,  and  social.* 
We  begin  with,  '  Mulattoes  intermarry,  and,  in  some  cases, 


i6  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

have  intermarried  for  generations ;'  we  then  read,  '  having 
as  little  in  common  with  their  black  as  with  their  white 
neighbours;  for  white  blood,  even  in  small  quantities, 
"  tells,"  and  the  pride  of  the  Mulatto  or  Quadroon,  as  a 
rule,  rebels  as  much  at  the  idea  of  alliance  with  the  Negro 
as  does  the  pride  of  the  white  at  the  idea  of  alliance  with 
coloured  or  black.'  But  Laird  Clowes  takes  care  to  tell  us 
that  only  '  in  some  cases  '  Mulattoes  '  have  intermarried  for 
generations,'  for  these  '  some  cases  '  may  mean  in  '  very  few 
instances'  they  (the  Mulattoes)  have  intermarried  for 
generations  amongst  themselves,  to  the  exclusion  of  their 
full-blooded  kinsmen  ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  there  are  the 
'  other  cases,'  the  greater  number  of  cases,  in  which  they 
have  not  intermarried  for  generations  exclusively  amongst 
themselves.  Whom  do  those  who  compose  the  'other 
cases,'  the  greater  number  of  cases,  then  marry,  if  they 
have  '  as  little  in  common  with  their  black  as  with  their 
white  neighbours '  ?  Do  these  marry  their  pure-blooded 
kinsmen  and  countrymen,  or  do  they  marry  their  white 
neighbours,  whose  pride  rebels  '  at  the  idea  of  alliance  with 
coloured  or  black'?  If  these  do  neither,  what  do  they  do? 
Do  they  stand  aloof  from  their  black  as  from  their  white 
neighbours,  and  consequently  wither  and  perish  ?  Our 
ideas  of  human  nature  and  our  common-sense  tell  us  that 
the  Mulattoes  and  other  Africans  of  mixed  blood,  when 
they  do  not  intermarry  amongst  themselves,  do  not  wither 
and  become  extinct,  but  intermarry,  not  only  with  their  full- 
blooded  African  kinsmen,  but  also  in  many  instances  inter- 
marry with  the  whites,  just  as  the  full  blacks  intermarry  with 
the  whites  all  the  world  over.  Mr.  Frederick  Douglass 
(who  is  a  Mulatto)  had  for  his  first  wife  a  Black  American 
lady  of  full,  unmixed  blood.  That  one  example  will  suffice 
for  many. 

It  is  also  an   absurdity  to   say  that   white   blood  '  tells ' 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN,  17 

when  blacks  intermarry  with  whites  nowadays.  Mr. 
Frederick  Douglass's  present  wife,  it  is  well  known,  is  a 
white  '  belle '  of  the  Sunny  South.  That  the  late  General 
Solomon,  the  distinguished  President  of  Hayti,  was  married 
to  a  Parisian  lady  of  '  la  belle  France,'  and  by  her  had  a 
daughter,  who  is  a  lady  doctor  of  great  eminence,  who 
graduated  in  one  of  the  very  best  of  Parisian  medical 
institutions,  and  is  now  practising  in  her  Hayti  home,  in  her 
Fatherland,  is  common  knowledge.  General  ex-President 
Legitime,  of  Playti,  is  also  wedded  to  a  fair  Parisian.  And 
that  hero  of  duty,  the  late  gallant,  brave,  honest  and  patriotic 
French  soldier,  General  Faidherbe,  Senator  and  Chancellor 
of  the  Legion  of  Honour,  who  in  1870-71,  as  commander- 
in-chief  of  the  Army  of  the  North,  distinguished  himself 
against  the  Germans,  particularly  at  Pont  de  Noyelle  and 
Bapaume,  and  who,  from  1854  to  1865,  was  Governor  of 
Senegal,  was  married  to  an  African — a  Senegalese  who  was 
as  black  as  she  was  beautiful.  The  chief  magistrate  of  the 
Gambia,  John  Renner  Maxwell,  Esq.,  an  African,  has  a 
British  wife.  If  Mr.  Clowes  tells  us  that  the  white  blood 
of  the  Romans  who  did  not  intermarry  with  Britishers 
*told,'  we  shall  beHeve  him.  It  is  on  record,  indeed, 
that  the  Latin  blood  of  the  Romans  really  rebelled 
at  the  idea  of  matrimonial  alliance  with  degenerated 
Britishers.  If  Laird  Clowes  is  ignorant  of  the  fact  and 
doubts  us,  there  are  several  histories  of  England,  and  it 
would  be  well  to  look  these  up. 

Africans,  however,  as  we  have  had  occasion  to  mention, 
do  intermarry  with  whites,  though  sixty  years  of  freedom 
have  not  yet  gone  over  the  heads  of  those  of  us  Africans 
who  live  under  European  and  American  flags ;  and  our 
forefathers,  and  the  immediate  fathers  of  many  of  us,  were 
slaves.  The  Liberians,  Haytians,  and  Dominicans  do  also 
intermarry  with  Caucasians. 


i8  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Let  us  suppose  that  the  Mulattoes,  and  other  Africans 
of  mixed  blood,  have  '  little  in  common  with  their  full- 
blooded  kith  and  kin,'  and  that  their  white  blood  *  tells ;'  if 
so,  we  are  at  a  loss  to  understand  how  the  African  of 
mixed  blood  can  be  '  the  natural  leader'  of  the  other 
branch  of  Africans — that  is,  the  full-blooded  blacks  ;  and 
we  should  like  the  uninformed  reader  to  be  reminded 
that  there  are  two  chief  branches  of  Africans,  viz.,  (i)  the 
Full-blooded  African,  whose  blood  has  never  been  mixed, 
and  (2)  those  whose  veins  may  contain  an  admixture  of 
Caucasian,  Asiatic,  or  iVmerican  Indian  blood,  coupled  with 
that  of  the  Black ;  who  nevertheless  belong  to  the  same 
African-Ethiopian  family,  and  are  therefore  kinsmen,  and 
descendants  of  Ham — '  in  all  movements,  political,  religious, 
and  social,'  when  they  have  '  little  in  common '  with  the  Full- 
blooded  African.  Can  it  be  that  the  Mixed-blooded  Africans 
have  only  to  show  themselves  amongst  the  Full-blooded 
Africans,  and  are  instantly  made  leaders,  or  do  they  simply 
elect  themselves  leaders  ?  But  the  Mixed-blooded  is  not 
the  '  natural  leader '  of  the  Full-blooded  African  in  move- 
ments political,  religious,  or  social.  He  may  be  the  leader 
when  he  is  the  most  capable  man,  but  he  is  not  the  '  natural 
leader.'  It  is  true  that  Frederick  Douglass,  a  Mulatto,  is 
the  recognised  leader  of  the  Africans  in  the  United  States 
to-day,  but  that  fact  does  not  prove  the  Mixed-blooded  to 
be  universally  and  always  the  '  natural  leader  '  of  the  Full- 
blooded  African.  The  choice  of  leadership  lies  always  with 
the  Full-blooded  African.  If  he  is  the  most  distinguished 
man,  he  leads ;  if  he  is  not,  he  may  follow  the  leadership  of 
one  of  Mixed  blood.  The  Full-blooded  and  Mixed-blooded 
Africans  have  fought  shoulder  to  shoulder  and  side  by  side 
in  bygone  days,  and  will  fight  again  shoulder  to  shoulder  and 
side  by  side  in  the  future.  We  Africans — both  Full  and 
Mixed-blooded — are  proud  of  Frederick  Douglass,  and  re- 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  19 

cognise  in  him  the  capable  and  distinguished  generalissimo 
of  all  Africans  living  under  European  and  American  flags 
throughout  the  world.  On  the  other  hand,  we  ask  Laird 
Clowes  this  question — when  the  Haytians  rose  in  insurrec- 
tion in  1 791,  who  were  their  leaders  ?  Were  their  leaders  of 
full  or  mixed  blood  ?  History  tells  us  that  Jean  Frangois  and 
Biassou  were  Africans  of  full  blood,  and  they  were  the  leaders 
of  the  Haytian  insurrection  of  1791. 

When  the  Haytians  were  bravely  battling  for  Indepen- 
dence (after  the  leadership  of  Jean  Frangois  and  Biassou 
terminated  by  their  deaths),  who  was  their  'natural  leader,' 
a  Mixed  or  Full-blooded   African?     History  tells   us  that 
Toussaint  the  Great — Toussaint  L'Ouverture,  the  Liberator 
of  his  fellow-countrymen,  who  gave  Hayti  practical  Inde- 
pendence— was  a  Full-blooded  African.     He  was  the  Creator 
and  Regenerator  of  the  Haytians,  and  their  first  President. 
He  was  the  most  distinguished  African  statesman  and  soldier 
of  modern  times — one  of  the  most  distinguished  statesmen 
and  soldiers  of  all  times.     He  takes   rank  among  all  dis- 
tinguished soldiers  and  statesmen  of  European  parentage, 
both  ancient  and  modern.     After  the  treacherous  seizure 
of  Toussaint  the  Great,  and  his  conveyance  as  a  prisoner 
to  France,  where  he  was  confined  in  a  dungeon  and  died, 
under  the  refined  cruelties  perpetrated  at  the  instance  of 
the  First  Napoleon,  round  whom  did  the  Haytians  rally  ? 
Did  they  rally  under  a  Mixed-blooded  African  ?     We  say 
not.    Jacques  Dessalines  (afterwards  Jacques  I.,  Emperor  of 
the  Haytians)  was  their  commander-in-chief,  was  the  leader^ 
and  he  was  a  Full-blooded  Ethiopian,  and  coal-black ;  he 
was  African  born ;  he  came  from  the  Gold  Coast,  and  ably 
did  he  fill  up  the  place  of  Toussaint  the  Great,  a  nd  lead  to 
victory  his  Haytian  people. 

When  the  Jamaican  Maroons  rose  in  rebellion  in  1750  and 
1795,  whom  had  they  to  lead  them  ?     Were  their  leaders  of 

2 — 2 


20  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

mixed  or  full  blood  ?  It  is  on  record  that  their  leaders  and 
advisers  were  Africans  of  full  blood. 

Sebituane,  chief  of  the  Makololo,  in  South  Africa — who 
was  the  contemporary  of  Livingstone,  and  whom  Living- 
stone praises  and  alleges  to  have  been  '  unquestionably  the 
greatest  man  in  all  that  country '  {i.e.,  South  Africa),  and 
who  fought  so  bravely  and  successfully  to  regain  the  posses- 
sion of  his  native  land— was  an  African  of  full  blood. 

We  repeat  that  the  Mixed-blooded  African  leads  when 
his  abilities  qualify  him,  and  George  William  Gordon,  the 
Jamaican  African,  the  hero-martyr  of  1865,  and  Leader  of 
the  Opposition  to  Colonel  Eyre's  Jamaican  Government, 
was,  we  believe,  a  Mulatto.  He  it  was  who  raised  the 
standard  of  Africo- Jamaican  Rebellion  in  1865,  and  had  he 
been  actively  supported  by  the  great  majority  of  his  country- 
men, who  sedulously  kept  aloof,  Jamaica  would  ere  this  have 
come  to  occupy  a  place  amongst  the  independent  nations  of 
the  earth.  We  referred  to  Africo-Jamaican  rebellion  ;  it  was 
not  a  rebellion  !  if  anything,  it  could  only  have  been  a  mere 
revolt — a  rising.  The  rising  was  suppressed,  and  George 
William  Gordon,  the  leader  of  the  rising,  was  seized,  under- 
went a  mock  trial  for  high  treason,  and  was  lynched,  not 
hanged — murdered,  not  executed.  For  the  so-called  execu- 
tion by  hanging  was  the  result  of  a  mock  trial.  That  it 
was  so  can  be  evidenced  by  the  protest  raised  by  the  British 
people  after  Gordon's  judicial  murder,  against  Colonel  Eyre, 
on  whose  head  lie  the  blood  and  responsibility  of  the  death 
of  the  martyred  Gordon.  It  makes  no  difference  to  us 
whether  the  Mixed  or  the  Full-blooded  African  leads.  Let 
the  man  who  is  capable  lead,  whoever  he  may  be. 

Theodore,  the  greatest  King  or  Emperor  of  the  Abys- 
sinians,  was  an  African  of  full  blood.  And  he  was  a  distin- 
guished ruler,  though  unfortunate.  He  was  also  a  capable 
soldier,  and  thoroughly  civilized.  Osai  Tutu  Quamina,  who 
was  King  of  the  Ashantees  from  1800  to  1824,  was  a  Full- 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  21 

blooded  African.  He  it  was  who  inflicted  the  demoralizing 
defeat  on  Britishers  under  Sir  Charles  McCarthy  in  1824, 
on  the  banks  of  the  Adoomansoo.  King  Tshaka,  or  Chaka, 
who  lived  at  the  beginning  of  this  (nineteenth)  century,  and 
who  was  the  founder  of  the  great  Zulu  Empire,  which 
stretched  from  the  confines  of  Cape  Colony  to  the  lands 
watered  by  the  Limpopo  and  Makoma,  was  a  Full-blooded 
African  Quamina. 

Langalibalele,  Chief  of  the  Amazulu  Caffirs,  in  Natal, 
who  led  the  well-known  movement  in  1873,  was  a  Full- 
blooded  African.  Placido,  the  Cuban  patriot  and  poet, 
who  fell  a  victim  to  the  resentment  of  the  Spaniards, 
at  whose  hands  he  suffered  death,  was  a  Full-blooded 
African.  Zulu  King  Cetewayo,  who  inflicted  the  disastrous 
defeat  on  Britishers  at  Isandhlwana,  Inyezane,  Intombi, 
and  Hloblane,  not  long  ago,  was  a  Full-blooded  African. 
His  unfortunate  son,  Prince  Dinizulu — who  a  few  years  ago 
led  the  well-known  movement  to  regain  his  fatherland  and 
the  throne  of  his  ancestors,  and  is  now  an  exile  in  St. 
Helena — is  an  African  of  full  blood.  His  Lordship  the  Right 
Rev.  Dr.  Crowther,  who  was  made  Bishop  of  the  Niger  by 
the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  under  the  auspices  of  Lord 
Palmerston's  Government,  in  1864,  was  formerly  a  slave. 
He  was  an  African  of  full  blood,  and  is  the  first  black  Bishop 
the  British  ever  consecrated.  The  Right  Rev.  Bishop  Burns, 
of  the  American  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  was  a  full- 
blooded  African,  and  he  was  a  very  learned  man.  An 
eminent  American- African  scholar  was  the  late  Right  Rev. 
Bishop  Payne,  Principal  of  the  Wilberforce  University  for 
the  Freedmen  in  America,  but  he  was  not  of  mixed  blood. 

To  say,  then,  that  the  Mixed-blooded  is  '  the  natural 
leader '  of  the  Full-blooded  African  is  absurd  in  the  extreme, 
and  shows  that  Mr.  Clowes  knows  very  little  about  Africans. 
To  say,  also,  that  the  mixed-blooded  has  '  little  in  common ' 
with  the  Full-blooded  African  is  equally  absurd.     The  full- 


22  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

blooded  and  mixed-blooded  Africans  fought  shoulder  to 
shoulder  under  the  leadership  of  Toussaint  the  Great,  and 
then  under  that  of  Dessalines.  In  the  days  of  slavery  they 
(the  Africans)  suffered  together  and  perished  together.  The 
full-blooded  and  the  mixed  blooded  Ethiopians  have  one 
common  destiny  because  they  are  one  African  people. 

Laird  Clowes  has  certainly  made  a  clumsy  attempt  to 
sow  discord  and  dissension  amongst  us  Africans.  There 
are  to-day,  in  Liberia,  in  Hayti,  and  everywhere  else  where 
the  descendants  of  Ham  are  to  be  found,  both  full  and 
mixed  blooded  Africans.  They  are  one  people,  and  must 
live  and  die  together.  The  greatest  ruler  Hayti  has  ever 
had — next  to  Toussaint  the  Great,  Jacques  L  (Dessalines), 
Henry  L  (Christophe)  and  Boyer— was  undoubtedly  Fetion, 
and  he  was  a  Mulatto,  and  an  administrator  of  more  than 
ordinary  talent. 

Says  Laird  Clowes,  on  pages  172  and  173  of  'Black 
America  ' :  '  In  our  West  Indian  colonies  there  are  about 
10,000  coolies,  of  whom  Mr.  Froude  says:  "They  are 
proud,  and  will  not  intermarry  with  the  Africans.  If  there 
is  no  jealousy,  there  is  no  friendship.  The  two  races  are 
more  absolutely  apart  than  the  white  and  the  black."  '  First 
of  all,  in  the  British  West  Indies  there  are,  at  the  very  least, 
100,000,  and  not  'about  10,000,'  Coolies.  Consequently 
Clowes  blunders  from  the  very  beginning,  and  so  on  to  the 
end,  as  we  shall  prove  in  due  time.  Mr.  Froude,  when  he 
says,  in  his  '  English  in  the  West  Indies,'  '  there  are  about 
J  0,000'  Coolies,  is  undoubtedly  wrong.  And  Mr.  Clowes 
slavishly  fell  into  the  same  error  by  taking  Froude's  state- 
ment as  law  on  the  subject.  Mr.  Froude  speaks  of  the 
Trinidadian  Coolies,  and  he  knows  very  little  about  them 
(just  as  little  as  he  knows  of  the  Africans),  for  there  are  in 
Trinidad  at  present  70,000  Coolies  at  the  very  least.  And 
we  make  bold  to  say  that  when  Froude  took  his  short  trip 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  23 

to  Trinidad  there  were  over  60,000  Coolies  in  the  aforesaid 
island.     Now  for  other  blunders. 

Laird  Clowes  cannot  in  any  way  be  congratulated  on  his 
prudence  or  foresight,  which  we  would  have  been  only  too 
happy  to  have  seen  in  him,  our  opponent  though  he  be ; 
for  had  Mr.  Clowes,  before  quoting  James  Anthony  Froude, 
who  says  on  page  73,  chapter  vi.,  in  'The  English  in  the 
West  Indies,'  that  'They'  (meaning  the  coolies)  '  are  proud, 
however,  and  will  not  intermarry  with  the  Africans,' 
looked  on  page  68,  and  higher  up  on  the  same  page 
(73)  in  the  same  chapter  (vi.)  in  'The  English  in  the 
West  Indies,'  he  would  have  observed  that  Mr.  Froude 
says  on  page  68,  that  'My  friend'  {i.e.^  Bertie  Gatty,  who 
was  a  briefless  barrister  before  he  was  given  a  Civil  Service 
appointment  in  the  West  Indies  through  backstairs  in- 
fluence) '  drove  me  round  the  town  in  his  buggy  the  next 
morning '  after  his  arrival  in  Trinidad ;  and  who  (the  same 
Froude)  further  on  in  the  same  chapter  (vi.),  on  page  73, 
moreover  adds,  '  In  Trinidad,  as  everywhere  else,  my  own 
chief  desire  was  to  see  the  human  inhabitants,  to  learn 
what  they  were  doing,  how  they  were  living,  and  what 
they  were  thinking ;  and  this  could  best  be  done  by  drives 
about  the  town  and  neighbourhood.'  Now,  could  Mr. 
Froude,  whilst  driving  in  his  buggy  round  the  town  of 
Port-of-Spain,  the  city  and  capital  which  contains  35,000 
inhabitants,  have  seen  between  60,000  and  70,000  Coolies, 
have  learnt  what  the  human  inhabitants  were  doing,  and 
how  they  were  living,  all  in  one  morning's  drive  ?  If  there 
ever  were  grave  statements  made  that  were,  in  fact, 
ridiculous  and  childish,  those  statements  quoted  above  are. 
Mr.  Froude  could  not  have  seen  all  the  human  inhabitants, 
35,000  souls,  in  one  morning.  Since  there  are  few  Coolies 
in  the  capital — the  greater  part  being  in  the  country — it 
was  impossible  for   him  to  have  seen  all  the  Coolies,  or 


24  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  greater  part  of  them,  in  one  morning,  and  found  out  that 
*  They  are  proud,  and  will  not  intermarry  with  the  Africans.' 
Froude  no  doubt  saw  some  of  the  Coolies  of  the  capital  *  by 
drives  about  the  town  and  neighbourhood  '  in  one  morning  ! 
The  Coolies,  as  we  have  said,  are  few  in  numbers  in  the 
capital,  but  there  are  two  divisions  of  Coolies,  at  least,  in 
religion  :  there  are  Hindoo  Coolies,  and  there  are  Mahom- 
medan  Coolies  ;  these,   however,  in  no  way  represent   the 
voice  of  their  countrymen  in  the  country  districts,  who  are 
in  a  preponderating  majority.     We  venture  to  say  that  Mr. 
Froude  did  not  see  all,  or  even  the  majority,  of  the  few 
Coolies  resident  in  Port-of-Spain,  in  County  St.  George.    To 
that  fact  let  us  add  the  fact,  that  he  did  not  see  the  vast 
majority  of  Coolies  scattered  throughout  the  Counties  of 
St.  David,  Caroni,  St.  Andrew,  Victoria,  Nariva,  St.  Patrick, 
Mayaro.     As  his  'drives  about  the  town'  did  not  enable 
him  to  see  these  latter,  how  came  he  to  know  that  '  they 
are    proud,   and    will  not  intermarry  with  the   Africans  '  ? 
The  vast  majority  of  the  Trinidadian  Coolies  are  illiterate. 
Because  they  are  illiterate  they  do  not   correspond  with 
each  other ;  we  mean,  that  those   in  the  country  do  not 
write  to  those  in  the  capital,  and  vice  versa,  because  they 
are  almost  all  illiterate.     As  they  are  illiterate,  they  neither 
write  books  nor  read  books ;  they  neither  read  the  newspapers 
nor  have  they  newspapers  ;  nor  do  they  write  to  the  news- 
papers   to   express   their   thoughts   and    make   the    world 
know  that  '  they  are  proud,  and  will  not  intermarry  with 
the  Africans.'     Those  in  the  capital  do  not  see  those  in  the 
country,  and  they  do  not  write  and  exchange  confidences 
with  each  other,  and    say  that  'they  will  not   intermarry 
with    the  Africans,'  because  they  are  illiterate.     There  is 
not    one    barrister,   solicitor,   or    doctor   to    be    met  with 
throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of  Trinidad  who  is  of 
Asiatic,  Indian,  or  Coolie  parentage.     They  are  an  illiterate 
class.     If  so,  what  can  they  have  to  be  proud  of?     Mr. 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  25 

Froude  could  not  have  seen,  we  say,  all  the  Coolies — even 
all  of  those  resident  in  the  capital — even  though  the  horse 
which  drew  him  in  his  friend's  buggy  was  the  winged  horse 
Pegasus  himself,  and  its  driver  and  master,  Bertie  Gatty, 
or  James  Anthony  Froude,  was  himself  a  Bellerophon. 

Here  is  an  entire  absence  of  evidence  to  bear  out  Fronde's 
statement,  that  the  Coolies  are  proud  and  will  not  inter- 
marry with  the  Africans.  No  man  has  yet  ventured  to 
express  similar  sentiments,  and  no  representative  Coolies 
have  yet  come  forward  to  bear  out  the  statements  ;  we 
therefore  say  that  Fronde's  mere  assertion  that  the  Coolies 
'  are  proud,'  and  because  of  their  pride  '  will  not  intermarry 
Africans,'  does  not  hold  water.  Moreover,  he  did  not 
know  the  Coolies  in  the  provinces.  We  do  not  know 
whether  he  formed  his  own  independent  opinion,  or 
whether  his  host  Gatty  put  him  au  coiirant  by  giving  his 
own  opinion  with  regard  to  so-called  Coolie  pride,  and  their 
alleged  aversion  to  intermarriage  with  the  Africans.  It  is, 
however,  of  no  great  consequence  to  us  whether  Froude 
formed  his  own  opinion  or  Gatty  told  Froude  what  he 
thought.  Gatty  knows  as  little  about  the  Coolies  as  he 
knows  about  the  general  affairs  of  the  colony.  Gatty,  a 
Member  of  both  the  Executive  and  Legislative  Councils, 
and  the  Crown's  chief  law  officer  in  the  island,  ought  to 
have  known,  at  least  from  official  sources,  and  as  an  official, 
if  not  as  a  private  individual,  that  there  were  in  Trinidad, 
during  Froude's  visit,  at  least  60,000  Coolies  in  the  Island, 
and  ought  not  to  have  allowed  Froude  to  fall  into  such  an 
error.  But  Bertie  is  a  bird  of  passage  and  migratory — is 
not  really  interested  in  the  affairs  of  the  colony. 

The  same  remarks  apply  also  to  the  other  portion  of 
Clowes's  quotation  from  Froude,  viz.,  'if  there  is  no  jea- 
lousy, there  is  no  friendship.  The  two  races  are  more 
absolutely  apart  than  the  white  and  the  black.'  We  must 
add,  however,  a  few  words,  and  say  that  the  Africans  are 


26  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  people  who  will  not  intermarry  with  the  Coolies,  because 
they  (the  Africans)  are  too  proud ;  and  the  Coolies  render 
matters  worse  by  their  general  behaviour.  Let  the  Coolies 
give  up  the  heathenish  and  barbarous  custom  of  blackening* 
their  teeth  ;  let  them  stop  mangling  their  ears  and  noses 
and  the  reddening  of  their  tongues,  by  giving  up  their 
customs  and  ceasing  to  partake  of  nauseous,  unsavoury,  and 
unpalatable  articles  of  food,  because  such  things  are  dis- 
tasteful and  abhorrent  to  us  Africans,  who  despise  all  things 
that  have  a  tendency  to  degrade  us,  or  which  savour  of  the 
uncivilized  When  the  Coolies  see  the  propriety  of  dressing 
in  a  manner  which  would  make  the  casual  observer  believe 
that  they  are  a  civilized  people,  if  only  in  an  outward  sense, 
and  when  they  cease  to  go  abroad  in  a  state  of  semi- 
nudity  ;  when  the  Coolies  give  up  boiling  and  eating  their 
repulsive  food  or  diet ;  when  the  Coolies  put  a  stop  to  oil- 
ing their  bodies,  an  act  which  gives  their  shiny  bodies  the 
appearance  of  gliding  snakes,  especially  in  the  dry  season ; 
when  they  cease  bathing  their  heads  with  oleaginous  liquid, 
the  smell  of  which  is  the  reverse  of  odoriferous  ;  and,  lastly, 
when  they  see  the  propriety  of  changing  their  Hindoo  or 
Mohammedan  faith,  with  the  superstitious  rites  accompany- 
ing it,  and  embrace  the  truths  of  Christianity — when  they 
do  all  these,  we  say,  and  when  they  have  undergone  a  com- 
plete transformation,  then,  and  only  then,  shall  we  pro- 
gressive Africans  join  in  wedlock  with  them  (the  Asiatic 
Indians),  but  not  before.  It  is  we  Africans  who  will  have 
nothing  to  do  with  the  Indian  Coolies  as  far  as  intermarriage 
is  concerned.  And  we  say,  in  conclusion,  that  *  the  two 
races' — that  is,  the  African  and  the  Asiatic  Coolie — are 
only  too  truly  '  more  absolutely  apart  than  the  white  and 

*  One  may  use  either  '  blacking '  or  'blackening,'  for  which 
see  Webster's  International  Dictionary,  Johnson's  English  Dic- 
tionary, or  Chamber's  English  Dictionary. 


THE  AFRICO-AMERICAN.  27 

the  black'  in  Trinidad.  Whatever  the  attitude  of  the  African 
towards  the  Asiatic,  and  the  Asiatic  towards  the  African,  may 
be  in  Trinidad,  in  the  British  West  Indies  it  is  not  a  hostile 
one.  Let  us  leave  the  African  and  the  Asiatic  in  Trinidad, 
and  view  them  elsewhere.  Let  us  for  a  moment  consider 
the  condition  of  the  Asiatic  and  the  African  in  Asia. 

Are  Mr.  Clowes  and  Mr.  Froude  aware  that  there  are 
thousands  of  Africans  in  Asia,  particularly  in  Arabia  and 
India  ?  Are  they  aware  that,  when  the  Indian  Mutiny 
broke  out,  and  throughout  the  year  it  lasted,  the  Nizam  of 
Hyderabad,  with  a  splendid  force  of  100,000  soldiers,  of 
whom  the  best  and  the  most  efficient  and  bravest  were 
Africans,  held,  with  the  greatest  facility,  the  southern 
portion  of  India  for  the  British  ;  and  that  if  the  Nizam, 
the  most  powerful  prince  of  the  most  powerful  native 
State  in  India,  had  but  joined  the  Sepoys,  the  British 
Empire  would  have  crumbled  to  pieces?  Is  Mr.  Clowes 
and  is  Mr.  Froude  aware  that  the  best  officers  and  the 
best  soldiers  in  the  present  Nizam  of  Hyderabad's  Army 
are  African  Mahommedans  ? 

Are  they  aware  that  an  African,  in  the  ninth  century, 
reigned  and  ruled  as  Khalif  at  Bagdad  ?*  Are  they  aware 
that  the  Great  Asiatic,  Mahommed,  had  as  Crier  or  Herald 
an  African  ?t  Are  they  aware  that  more  than  three-fourths 
of  the  Africans  of  Africa  are  Mahommedans,  and  were 
converted  by  Asiatics  ? 

*  '  Ibn  Khallikan's  Biographical  Dictionary,'  translated  from 
the  Arabic  by  Baron  Mac  Guckin  de  Slane,  vol.  i.,  pp.  16,  17, 
18  and  19. 

t  Muir's  '  Life  of  Mahomet,'  vol.  iii.,  p.  54. 


CHAPTER  II. 

IS    UNCLE    REMUS    INFERIOR    TO    THE    CAUCASIAN? 

When  given  the  same  advantages,  the  African  can  always 
hold  his  own  with  the  Caucasian,  and  is  in  no  way  inferior 
to  him.     We  have  shown  our  strength  in  the  past,   and 
have  produced  our  scholars,  as  we  are  doing  at  the  present 
time.     We  have  ourselves  witnessed  the  proud  and  glorious 
spectacle  of   black  scholars  snatching  away  prizes  which 
their  white  confreres  thought  were  within  their  easy  grasp. 
There  are   those  who  do    not   think   thus,  however,   but 
regard  us  as  mentally  inferior.     Those  who  do  are,  as  a 
rule,   very  ignorant  concerning  the    achievements    of  the 
Africans  in  all  the  various  branches  of  knowledge — of  both 
arts  and  sciences.     Indeed,  Laird  Clowes  throughout  his 
book  displays'  the  greatest  ignorance  respecting  the  past 
and   present   history   of  Africans.      He  applies   the   term 
'  childish  '  to  the  African ;  but  that  term  only  reveals  the 
ignorance  of  the  man  who  uses  it.     Even  Froude  has  not 
displayed    so   much   ignorance   as    Laird    Clowes,   though 
Froude's  knowledge  is  within  very  narrow  limitations. 

This  is  what  Laird  Clowes  says  on  page  76  of  his  ^  Black 
America '  :  'No  one  who  has  associated  much  with  the 
Negro  race  can  have  failed  to  have  remarked  that  in  the 
natural  time  of  childhood  the  Negro  is  apparently  as 
vivacious  and  as  intelligent  as  the  white.  With  the 
approach  of  puberty,  however,  the  two  races  begin  to  betray 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  29 

marked  intellectual  divergence.  The  white  steadily  pro- 
gresses in  intelligence,  the  black  stops  short ;  so  that  in  a 
few  years  the  latter  is  by  comparison  dull,  stupid,  and  in- 
dolent, though  still  frivolous,  affectionate,  good-natured,  and 
mischievous.  I  speak,  of  course,  of  the  average  Negro,  and 
more  especially  of  the  full-blooded  one.  There  are  ex- 
ceptions, but  they  are  few.  As  a  rule,  the  grown  Negro, 
even  if  he  have  received  a  better  education  than  the 
majority  of  his  fellows,  is  in  mind  always  a  child.'  In  brief, 
Mr.  Clowes  is  of  opinion  that  the  Ethiopian  is  in  nature 
inferior  to  the  Caucasian. 

We  Africans,  who  claim  the  extinct  Carthaginians  as  our 

countrymen,  cannot  be  inferior.     Does  Mr.  Clowes  know 

the  part  that  Carthage  played  in  the  world's  history  ?     Her 

part   was   a    most  distinguished  one.     Carthage   was    the 

greatest  State  that  ever  existed  in  Africa,     We   all  know 

that  the  Romans  never  encountered  a  mightier  nation  in 

arms  than  the  Carthaginian.     They  disputed  the  empire  of 

the  world  with  the  Romans.     But  some  people  say  that  the 

Carthaginians  were  not  of  the  Ethiopian,  but  of  the  Semitic 

stock.     Now,  we  all  know  that  the  Carthaginians  were  of 

Phoenician  origin,  and  we  are  also  aware  that  the  Phoenicians 

were  the  descendants  of  the  Canaanites,  and  often  styled 

themselves  Canaanites  ;  as  we  also  know  that  the  Canaanites 

were  the  descendants  of  Canaan,  who  was  a  son  of  Ham,  who 

was  the  founder  of  the  African  Ethiopian  Race.     Then,  by 

their  being  the  descendants  of  Ham,  the  Carthaginians  must 

have  belonged  to  the  Ethiopian  stock.     The  Carthaginians 

were  inferior  to  none  of  the  nations  of  the  ancient  world  in 

ability. 

By  the  way,  those  who  say  that  the  Carthaginians  were  of 
Semitic  origin  allege  that  the  Bible  is  wrong  in  classing 
Canaan  amongst  the  sons  of  Ham ;  and  that  Sidon,  the 
Hethite,  the  founder  of  the  Phoenicians,  and  Canaan's  first- 
born son,  was  not  a  descendant  of  Ham.     We  say  that  if 


30 


THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 


objections  be  taken  to  that  part  of  the  Bible  in  which  the 
statement  is  made  concerning  Canaan,  that  he  was  a  son  of 
Ham,  what  objections  may  not  be  taken  to  other  parts  of 
the  book  when  it  treats  of  other  historical  facts  ?  If  we 
believe  in  one  part,  we  ought  to  believe  in  another  part,  or 
discard  the  Bible  altogether.  We  believe  the  Bible  to  be 
quite  correct  in  giving  Canaan  as  a  son  of  Ham.  Besides, 
it  is  not  given  to  the  white  man  to  lay  down  the  law  to  the 
African  in  the  matter  of  Ethnography.  The  African  can 
see  and  reason  for  himself. 

To  resume.  The  Carthaginian  navy  was  the  best  the 
ancient  world  ever  saw.  Carthage  produced  men  like 
Hamilcar  Barca,  who,  as  a  statesman  and  soldier,  was 
second  only  to  his  son  Hannibal  the  Great,  amongst  the 
great  men  of  Carthage.  Carthage  also  produced  Hasdrubal, 
the  son-in-law  of  Hamilcar  Barca,  and  he  (Hasdrubal)  was 
a  capable  soldier,  but  a  more  distinguished  statesman. 
Carthage  gave  birth  also  to  the  brothers  Barcidae,  Hannibal, 
Hasdrubal,  and  Mago,  the  '  lion's  broods '  of  Hamilcar 
Barca.  The  three  sons  of  Hamilcar  whom  we  have  just 
mentioned  were  distinguished  for  soldiership  and  states- 
manship, but  the  eldest  of  them,  Hannibal,  was  the  greatest 
man  that  Carthage  ever  produced.  The  Romans,  it  is  a 
matter  of  history,  never  had  a  more  formidable  foe  to 
contend  with.  He  it  was  who  maintained  himself  for 
sixteen  years  in  Italy,  in  the  enemy's  country,  with  a  mixed 
army  of  Africans,  Gauls,  Spaniards,  Ligurians,  etc.,  unaided 
and  unsupported  by  his  country,  because  of  party  strife  at 
home.  Hannibal  the  Great  is  entitled  to  rank  with 
Alexander,  Caesar,  and  Napoleon,  both  as  a  soldier  and  as 
a  statesman.  Alexander  was  in  some  respects  inferior  to 
Hannibal ;  and  it  is  a  moot  point  with  historians  whether 
Julius  Caesar  and  Napoleon  were  really  greater  than  the 
Carthaginian  Hannibal. 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN  31 

If  the  Carthaginians  had  belonged  to  an  inferior  race, 
they  would  never  have  played  such  a  prominent  part  as  they 
have  done  in  the  world's  history. 

The  mother-country  and  parent  of  Carthage,  Phoenicia 
(which  consisted  of  Sidon,  Tyre,  Aradus,  etc.),  was  not  very 
inferior  to  Carthage,  and  it  also  occupies  a  distinguished 
place  in  ancient  history.  The  Phoenicians  were  the 
descendants  of  Sidon  the  Hethite,  who  was  the  first-born 
of  Canaan,  who  was  the  youngest  son  of  Ham.  The  Empire 
of  the  Phoenicians  was  a  mighty  one,  and  their  navy  was 
formidable.  If  the  Phoenicians  had  been  an  inferior  race, 
they  would  never  have  attained  such  greatness  in  the  olden 
times  as  they  did.  Does  not  the  Bible  give  the  country 
and  city  of  Nineveh,  the  country  of  the  Philistines,  and  the 
colossal  Babylon  as  belonging  also  to  the  children  of  Ham  ? 
And  Nineveh  and  the  Philistines  were  renowned,  while  the 
Babylonian  Empire,  at  least,  equalled  that  of  Carthage. 

The  Moors  of  Morocco  are  the  descendants  of  Asiatics 
and  Africans,  and  they  are  the  persons  whose  ancestors 
introduced  the  manufacture  of  cotton,  wool,  sugar,  silk, 
and  other  things  into  Spain  and  Portugal,"^  when 
those  countries  fell  before  their  conquering  arms  in  the 
years  710  and  711  a.d.  Nor  did  the  ancestors  of  these 
same  Moors  quit  Spain  and  Portugal  until  the  year  1609  of 
our  era.  Those  who  disparage  the  African  forget  that  the 
great  and  illustrious  geometrician,  Euclid,  was  an  African 
and  an  Ethiopian  ;  that  P.  Terentius  Afer,  commonly  called 
Terence,  the  friend  and  associate  of  P.  Cornehus  Scipio,  the 
African  (Africanus),  and  Laelius,  who  from  being  a  slave 
became  an  eminent  Latin  Author,  was  not  only  an  African , 
but  an  Ethiopian.!  Victor  I.,  who  succeeded  Eleutherius  as 
Pope  of  Rome  about  185  a.d.,  and  died  about  197  a.d., 

*  '  Encyclopsedia  Britannica.' 

t  Gr^goire's  '  Enquiry  on  Africans,'  p.  45. 


32  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

could  hardly  have  been  of  any  other  race  than  the  African- 
Ethiopian.  At  any  rate,  it  is  certain  that  he  was  a  native  of 
Africa.  He  could  not  have  been  childish,  nor  could  his 
talents  have  been  in  any  way  of  an  inferior  order,  or  the 
European  —  the  Italian  —  ecclesiastical  dignitaries,  the 
College  of  Cardinals,  would  not  have  made  him  Pope. 

Aurelius  Augustinus,  better  known  as  St.  Augustine,  who 
was  born  at  Tagaste,  now  called  Tajelt,  in  Northern  Africa, 
and  who  was  afterwards  Bishop  of  Hippo,  could  not  have 
been  of  European  origin,  or  a  descendant  of  Shem  ;  at  all 
events,  there  are  no  records  extant  to  show  that  he  was  of 
European  or  Asiatic  parentage  ;  and  we  must,  p7-ima  facie, 
as  he  was  born  in  Africa,  take  for  granted  that  he  was  an 
Ethiopian.  He  was  one  of  the  most  illustrious  Fathers  of 
the  Catholic  Church,  and  was  even  more  distinguished  than 
Ambrose,  Jerome,  or  Gregory  the  Great,  his  great  European 
colleagues.  He  wrote  some  forty  theological  works,  some 
of  them  of  permanent  value.  St.  Augustine  lived  from  354 
to  430  A.D.,  and  is  held  in  high  honour  by  all  good  and  true 
Catholics,  and  by  other  Christians.  Such  a  man  could  not 
have  had  talents  of  an  inferior  order.  The  Catholic  Order 
of  Augustinians  derives  its  name  from  this  illustrious  St. 
Augustine. 

The  next  greatest  African  theologian  was  undoubtedly 
Tertullian,  who  was  a  priest  of  Carthage,  and  lived  in  the 
third  century,  and  was  an  eminent  author,  the  best  known 
of  his  works  being  the  'Apology'  and  the  'Prescriptions.' 
Cyprian,  Bishop  of  Carthage,  who  lived  in  the  third  century, 
who  perished  as  a  martyr  under  Valerian,  was  of  African 
origin,  and  takes  his  place  next  to  Augustine  and  Tertullian 
among  the  eminent  uninspired  writers  and  saintly  men  who 
are  of  African  birth. 

Origen  of  Alexandria  was  a  very  prolific  and  distin- 
guished author,  who  wrote  many  more  books   than  even 


I^s.' 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  33 


ugustine.  Indeed,  we  do  not  believe  that  there  ever 
existed  a  more  prolific  author  in  ancient  or  modern  times 
than  Origen. 

Clemens  Alexandrinus,  who  was  born  about  the  middle  of 
the  second  century,  and  wrote  thirty  books ;  Cyril  of  Alex- 
andria ;  Monica,  the  mother  of  St.  Augustine ;  Leonidas,  the 
father  of  Origen ;  Perpetua  and  Felicitas,  who  suffered  martyr- 
dom under  Septimius  Severus  ;  Theophilus  of  Alexandria  : 
were  all  Africans,  and  their  careers  were  distinguished  ones. 

Were  all  these  men  and  women,  then,  '  dull,  stupid  and 
indolent,'  or  did  they  '  stop  short '  after  attaining  puberty  ? 
Was  every  one,  or  any  one,  of  those  just  mentioned  '  in 
mind  always  a  child  '  ? 

Would  the  grateful  and  impulsive  French  general  Laveaux, 
after  he  was  (as  the  result  of  a  conspiracy)  arrested  at  Cape 
Town,  in  Hayti,  and  then  released  by  Toussaint  L'Ouverture, 
full  of  enthusiasm  and  admiration  for  his  black  deliverer, 
have  proclaimed  him  the  protector  of  Frenchmen  and  the 
avenger  of  the  constituted  authorities,  and  created  him  first 
a  general  of  brigade,  next  a  general  of  division,  and  subse- 
quently commander-in-chief  of  the  French  forces  of  San 
Domingo,  if  Toussaint  the  Great  had  been  '  dull,  stupid  and 
indolent '? 

Surely  the  Frenchmen  who  drove  the  English  from  France 
(a.d.  145 1 )  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VI.,  and  finally  wrested 
Calais  from  the  grasp  of  the  First  Mary;  and  who  recaptured 
Toulon  in  1793  from  the  Britishers;  and  who,  in  1794, 
chased  the  allied  British  and  Austrians,  under  York,  out  of 
Flanders  and  Holland  ;  and  who  inflicted  the  humiliating 
and  disastrous  defeat  on  the  British  and  Austrians  at  Fon- 
tenoy,  in  1745,  must  be  supposed  to  know  how  to  choose 
th*^ir  commanders.  And  these  same  Frenchmen  made 
Toussaint  the  Great,  an  African,  commander-in-chief  of  San 
Domingo  and  of  the  French  army  therein.     Yes  ;  Toussaint 

3 


34  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

L'Ouverture,  who  gave  freedom  and  practical  independence 
to  his  Haytian  nation,  and  under  whom  agriculture  and 
commerce  flourished,  and  the  arts  of  peace  and  good 
government  were  encouraged,  could  not  have  been  '  dull, 
stupid  and  indolent,'  nor  could  he  have  been  '  in  mind  a 
child' 

Was  Dessalines  (who  afterwards  ascended  the  Haytian 
throne  as  Jacques  I.,  Emperor  of  the  Haytians),  who,  after 
he  had  seen  Toussaint  L'Ouverture  treacherously  seized  and 
conveyed  as  a  prisoner  to  France  by  the  perfidious  French, 
organized  a  Haytian  National  Army  to  regain  the  Inde- 
pendence which  Toussaint  had  practically  given  them,  to 
punish  the  French,  if  possible,  for  their  perfidy  and  treachery, 
*  in  mind  a  child,'  or  was  he  '  dull,  stupid  and  indolent '? 

Was  that  same  eminent  Dessalines,  who,  when  he  saw  that 
fortune  was  doubtful,  and  that  there  was  an  uncertainty  of 
his  successfully  coping  with  the  French  with  his  thin  lines  of 
Haytians,  sent  ambassadors  to  his  native  Africa  to  the  courts 
of  its  princes,  to  ask  for  a  reinforcement  of  Africans,  '  stern 
and  wild '?  He  knew  how  to  fight  in  the  cause  of  freedom 
and  independence,  and  he  succeeded  in  driving  away  the 
French  from  San  Domingo,  and  regaining  the  Independence 
for  his  Fatherland ;  and  was  he  '  dull,  stupid  and  indolent  ? 

Was  Christophe  (afterwards  Henri  L,  second  Emperor  of 
the  Haytians),  who,  when  he  perceived  that  the  scheming 
Frenchmen  were  taking  advantage  of  dissensions  in  Hayti, 
and  were  trying  to  regain  San  Domingo,  had  the  good  sense, 
patriotism  and  statesmanship  to  make  overtures  for  a  truce, 
and  sink  his  differences  with  his  rival  Petion,  and  unite  his 
forces  with  those  of  the  latter  to  defend  his  Fatherland 
against  the  encroachments  of  the  Gaul,  '  dull,  stupid  and 
indolent,'  or  was  he  '  in  mind  a  child  ?  Was  Petion  '  dull, 
stupid  and  indolent,'  and  '  in  mind  a  child,'  for  accepting 
Christophe's    overtures  ?      Geoffrey    L'Islet,    who   was   an 


I 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  35 


artillery  officer  m  the  French  army,  who  founded  a  scientific 
society  in  Mauritius,  when  that  island  belonged  to  France, 
who,  it  is  on  record,  although  he  had  very  few  facilities  for 
acquiring  know^ledge,  and  never  set  his  foot  in  Europe,  was 
an  accomplished  astronomer,  was  a  skilful  botanist,  and 
excelled  in  natural  philosophy  and  geometry  j  and  who,  in 
1786,  was  appointed  correspondent  in  Mauritius  by  that 
illustrious  body,  the  French  Academy  of  Sciences  ;  who  was 
also  a  hydrographer  of  the  first  class,  and  a  skilful  meteorolo- 
gist ;  and  whose  works  on  astronomy  received  official  recog- 
nition by  the  French  Government  in  1791,  could  not  have 
been  '  dull,  stupid  and  indolent.'     And  he  was  an  African. 

Antony  William  Amo,  an  African,  born  in  African  Guinea, 
about  the  year  1703;  who  in  1729  published  his  '  De  Jure 
Maurorum,'  and  in  1734  published  another  physiological 
dissertation  ;  who  in  the  latter  year  (1734)  graduated  as 
Doctor  in  Philosophy  at  the  University  of  Wittemburg,  in 
Germany ;  who  spoke  Hebrew,  Greek,  Latin,  German, 
French,  and  Dutch ;  who  was  an  accomplished  astronomer ; 
who  was  afterwards  made  Councillor  of  State  by  the  Court 
of  Berlin,  could  not  have  been  'dull,  stupid,  and  indolent.' 
And  he  was  a  full-blooded  African. 

Johann  Friedrich  Blumenbach,  the  eminent  German, 
who  was  a  Member  of  the  Academy  of  Sciences  of  Paris, 
and  physician  to  the  Third  Hanoverian  George  of  Great 
Britain  and  Ireland,  it  is  said,  recognised  the  great  abilities 
of  the  African,  and  eulogized  the  West  African,  Antony 
WiUiam  Amo. 

Another  African,  and  full-blooded  Ethiopian,  was  Benjamin 
Banneker,  of  EUicott's  Mills,  in  County  Baltimore,  in  the 
State  of  Maryland,  in  the  United  States.  He  takes  rank  as 
an  astronomerwith  other  great  astronomers  the  world  has  pro- 
duced, and  could  not  have  been  *  dull,  stupid,  and  indolent.' 

But  what  men  of  letters  and  arts  has  Africa  not  pro- 

3—2 


36  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

duced  ?     Toussaint  L'Ouverture  was  himself  an  author,  for 
he  wrote  a  Memoir  of  his  Life. 

Phillis  Wheatley,  the  African  Poetess  of  Boston,  Massachu- 
setts, was  born  in  Africa  about  1754 ;  she  was  a  full-blooded 
African,  and,  like  Toussaint  the  Great,  Dessalines,  Chris- 
tophe,  Amo,  Banneker,  and  others,  she  was  a  slave.  She 
wrote  several  poems  before  she  was  seventeen,  which 
attracted  and  received  the  approbation  of  eminent  scholars, 
and  became  bard  to  Selina,  Countess  of  Huntingdon,  who 
founded  the  branch  of  the  Church  now  known  by  the  name 
of  the  'Countess  of  Huntingdon's  Connexion.'  Phillis 
Wheatley  published  several  poems,  and  wrote  a  monody 
on  George  Whitefield's  death.  She  was  a  full-blooded 
African,  and  very  patriotic,  and  she  died  in  1784.  Wheatley 
is  not  the  only  poet  that  Africa  has  produced,  but  she  is 
perhaps  the  best.  At  any  rate,  her  name  is  in  the  front 
rank  of  African  poets.  We  now  ask  the  reader,  AVas  Phillis 
Wheatley,  the  contemporary  of  Benjamin  Franklin,  who 
received  the  patronage  of  Selina,  Countess  of  Huntingdon, 
and  the  admiration  of  John  Wesley,  '  dull,  stupid,  and  in- 
dolent,' or  was  she  '  in  mind  a  child '?  Supposing  she  were 
*  in  mind  a  child,'  then  she  could  have  been  '  in  mind'  only 
the  '  poetic  child,'  to  use  the  language  of  Sir  Walter  Scott. 
Africa,  'stern  and  wild,'  was  her  'meet  nurse.'  Was  that 
Africo-Frenchman,  General  of  Division  Alexandre  Dumas, 
who  was  surnamed  by  the  first  Napoleon  the  '  Horatius 
Codes  of  the  Tyrol,'  and  who  died  in  1807,  'dull,  stupid, 
and  indolent,'  or  was  he  '  in  mind  a  child '  ?  Was  that  dis- 
tinguished novelist,  dramatist,  and  romancer,  his  son, 
Alexandre  Davy  Dumas /^r^,  who  flourished  from  1802  to 
1870,  and  who  wrote  'Monte  Cristo,'  'The  Three  Mus- 
keteers,' and  a  vast  number  of  novels,  dramas,  and  romances 
too  numerous  to  mention,  '  dull,  stupid,  and  indolent,'  or 
was  he  '  in  mind  a  child '  ?     And  are  the  children  of  the 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  37 

last-named  (Alexandre  Davy  Dumas  p^re)^  and  grand- 
children of  the  first-named  (Alexandre  Dumas,  General  of 
Division),  Madame  Petel,  the  romancer,  and  Alexandre 
Davy  Dumas  fils,  novelist,  romancer,  and  dramatist,  who 
wrote  '  La  Dame  aux  Camelias,'  and  sundry  other  able 
works,  '  dull,  stupid,  and  indolent,'  or  are  they  '  in  mind 
children '  ? 

The  same  comments  and  remarks  will  apply  to  the 
African  poet,  Ignatius  Sancho,  who  was,  it  is  said, 
the  correspondent  and  contemporary  of  Laurence  Sterne, 
of  '  Tristram  Shandy '  and  '  Sentimental  Journey  through 
France  and  Italy'  celebrity,  as  well  as  to  the  Cuban 
Placido,  the  African  Poet-Patriot ;  to  the  Africo-American 
poet  Caesar,  who  was  born  in  North  Carolina ;  to  Capitien, 
who  wrote  Latin  in  both  prose  and  verse,  and  was,  like 
Phillis  Wheatley,  noted  for  his  saintly  life ;  to  the 
African  poet,  Francis  Williams,  who  was,  it  was  said,  a 
protege  of  one  of  the  Dukes  of  Montague  ;  to  the  poets 
Mrs.  Harper,  Miss  Watkins,  and  James  Whitbread;  and 
also  to  the  Kafir  Poet-Chief  Suana. 

These  are  not  the  only  celebrities  the' African  race  has 
produced.  The  good  people  of  Glasgow,  we  do  not  doubt, 
retain  the  memory  of  Dr.  James  McClure  or  McCune. 
Smith,  an  African,  who,  when  he  graduated  in  medi- 
cine in  the  Scottish  commercial  metropolis,  earned  the 
distinction  of  bearing  away  the  first  prize  from  five  hundred 
University  of  Glasgow  alumni.  He  was  not  *  dull,  stupid, 
and  indolent,'  nor  was  he  'in  mind  a  child,'  but  was 
enabled  to  defeat  the  Scotchmen  on  their  own  soil  and  in 
their  own  University. 

Give  Africans  the  same  chances  as  Caucasians,  and  the 
descendants  of  Ham  will  more  than  hold  their  own  against 
Japheth's  descendants  ;  they  will  not  '  stop  short.' 

But,  we  ask,  has  Laird  Clowes,  and  other  disparagers  of 


38  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  African,  ever  heard  of  such  men  as  Thomas  Fuller  the 
great  Arithmetician  ;  James  Derham,  a  very  distinguished 
Physician  of  New  Orleans ;  Samuel  Ringgold  Ward  of 
Toronto,  Ontario,  Can.,  the  brilliant  Abolitionist,  Orator, 
and  Clergyman,  who  was  for  two  and  a  half  years  (from 
April,  1 841)  the  black  Pastor  of  the  white  Congregational 
Church  of  South  Butler,  Wayne  Co.,  N.Y, ;  Thomas 
Jenkins;  James  William  Charles  Pennington,  D.D. ;  Henry 
Highland  Garnett ;  Alexander  Crummell ;  Thomas  Sipkins 
Sidney ;  Amos  G.  Beman ;  Madison  M.  Clarke  ;  Charles 
Lewis  Reason ;  Patrick  Henry  Reason ;  James  Forten ; 
Theodore  Sedgewick  Wright ;  Samuel  Todd ;  William 
Hamilton  ;  Richard  Allen ;  John  Gloucester ;  Peter  Wil- 
liams ;  George  Hogarth ;  Samuel  E.  Cornish ;  Jehiel  C. 
Beeman;  Stephen  Smith;  Timothy  Este;  William  Whipper; 
Pory-Papy,  who  was  the  Deputy  for  the  Colony  of  Marti- 
nique in  the  French  National  Assembly  in  1872  ;  William 
Wells  Brown;  Henry  Bibb;  Roper;  Christopher  Rush; 
Robert  Morris  ;  Macon  Bolden  Allen  ;  John  V.  Degrasse  ; 
Thdmas  Joiner  White ;  William  G.  Allen ;  George  B. 
Vashon  ;  William  Douglass  ;  William  Paul  Quinn  ;  Daniel 
A.  Poyne ;  William  H.  Bishop ;  WiUiam  Howard  Day ; 
John  J.  Gains;  Charles  Mercer  Longston ;  William  J. 
Watkins;  C.  E.  Taylor;  Ralph  Taylor;  Tanner;  C.  H. 
Thompson,  D.D.,  of  Newark,  New  Jersey;  John  M. 
Brown ;  James  Johnson  ;  George  T.  Downing — all  eminent 
scholars  and  philosophers  and  optiinates  of  our  (African) 
Race  and  the  world  ? 

Blyden,  on  whose  authority  these  names  are  given  (see 
'  Christianity,  Islam,  and  the  Negro  Race,'  by  Dr.  E.  W. 
Blyden),  also  notices,  on  the  authority  of  Muir,  that 
Mahommed's  first  Muezzin,  or  Crier,  was  an  African,  Billal 
by  name.  He  mentions,  too,  a  celebrated  African  Khalif, 
who  reigned  at  Bagdad  in  the  ninth  century ;  and  on  the 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.         39 

authority  of  Ibn  Khallikan,   one  Abu'l-Aswad  is  said  to 
have  been  the  first  to  reduce  to  system  the  Arabic  language. 

Another  distinguished  Ethiopian,  whose  name  might  have 
been  previously  given,  is  the  Africo-American,  George  W. 
Williams,  who  is  perhaps  the  only  African  who  has  attained 
high  military  rank  in  the  American  army.  He  played  a 
distinguished  part  in  the  late  American  Civil  War,  as  an 
officer  of  the  Federal  Army  of  the  North ;  was  a  member  of 
the  Ohio  Legislature,  and  Judge-Advocate  of  the  Grand 
Army  of  the  Republic  of  Ohio,  and  is  an  eminent  author. 

The   thirteen   rulers  of  the    Haytians  were  not    '  dull, 
stupid,  and  indolent,'  nor  is  the  present  President  of  Hayti, 
General  L.  M.  F.  Hippolyte,  who  is  a  man  of  distinguished 
parts,  and  has  many  admirers  amongst  Caucasians.     Like- 
wise the  Presidents  of  Liberia  were  men  of  distinguished 
ability.     The  present  President  of  Liberia  is  Mr.  J.  H.  R. 
W.  Johnson,  who  was  repeatedly  elected  to  the  office,  the 
people  thereby  showing  the  confidence  they  placed  in  him. 
He  is  also  a  distinguished  and  able  man.     It  would  be 
absurd  to  apply  the    term  '  dull,  stupid  and  indolent '  to 
him  ;  it  would  be  an  insult.     Joseph  Jenkins  Roberts,  the 
first   President  of  Liberia,  who  was   more  than  twice  re- 
elected to  the  office  by  his  fellow-citizens,  was  a  man  of  the 
greatest  ability :  we  doubt  whether  Liberia  has  ever  had  a 
more  distinguished  man  as  her  President;  and  he  was — like 
Toussaint,  the  first  President  of  Hayti — born  a  slave  ;  but 
he  could  not  have  been   '  dull,  stupid,  and  indolent,'  nor 
could   he   have   been    '  in   mind   a   child.'     We  dare  say 
Messrs.  Hyde,  Hodge,  and  Co.,  of  London,  contractors  with 
Her   Britannic   Majesty's    Aberdeen    Government,    under- 
rated the  powers  and  capacities  of  the  great  Roberts,  and 
thought  him  '  dull,  stupid,  and  indolent,'  and  '  in  mind  a 
child,'  for  the  aforesaid  gentlemen,  who  held  a  contract 
with  Lord  Aberdeen's  Government  for  furnishing  African 


40  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

labourers  to  the  West  Indies,  sent,  in  1853,  some  of  their 
ships  to  the  coast  of  the  Liberian  Republic  in  quest  of 
labourers,  at  the  same  time  offering  an  advance  of  ten 
dollars  to  anyone  who  might  be  induced  to  emigrate.  Presi- 
dent Roberts  was  sufficiently  astute  to  perceive  that  Messrs. 
Hyde,  Hodge,  and  Co.,  the  contractors,  were  trying  to 
revive  slavery  and  the  slave-trade ;  and  by  Proclamation 
the  great  Roberts  put  a  veto  on  all  emigration  from  the 
Liberian  Republic,  and  warned  the  agents  of  Messrs.  Hyde, 
Hodge,  and  Co.  off  his  shores."*  Joseph  Jenkins  Roberts, 
one  of  the  fathers  of  Liberia,  and  one  of  the  authors  of  its 
Independence,  died  on  February  25,  1874. 

George  William  Gordon,  the  Leader  of  the  Opposition  to 
Colonel  Eyre's  Government  in  Jamaica ;  Richard  Hill, 
Edward  Jordan,  Peter  Moncrieff,  were  all  of  Jamaica,  and 
were  eminent  statesmen,  but  they  were  Africans ;  these  were 
not  '  dull,  stupid  and  indolent,'  nor  were  they  '  in  mind 
children.' 

Would  Mitchell  Maxwell  Phillip  have  been  appointed 
Solicitor-General  of  Trinidad  had  he  been  '  dull,  stupid  and 
indolent '?  Or  if  he  were  '  in  mind  a  child '.?  Small  credit 
would  be  given  to  the  British  Government  if  it  appointed  an 
African  to  a  Government  post  who  was  '  dull,  stupid  and 
indolent,'  or  who  was  '  in  mind  a  child.'  Maxwell  Phillip  was 
not  only  a  law  officer  of  the  Crown,  but  he  was  a  legislator, 
and  figured  as  an  author,  but  he  was  an  African.  The  late 
Mr.  John  Jacob  Thomas,  whom  we  knew  personally,  was  a 
grammarian  and  author.  It  was  his  pen  that  supplied  a 
long-felt  want  of  those  who  were  ignorant  of  the  French 
Creole  patois.  The  'Creole  Grammar,'  by  John  Jacob 
Thomas,  was  published  not  many  years  ago. 

When  we  referred  to  the  statesmen  of  Liberia,  we  might 
have  mentioned  the  illustrious,  the  immortal  Hilary  Tange, 

*  See  Proclamation  of  February  26,  1853. 


k 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  41 


late  Secretary  of  State  of  the  Liberian  Republic.  He  was 
one  of  the  founders  of  Liberian  Independence,  and  takes 
rank  with  Joseph  Jenkins  Roberts,  James  Spriggs  Payne, 
A.  VV.  Gardner  (who  was  dubbed  Knight  of  the  Grand 
Cross  of  the  Royal  Order  of  Isabel  the  Catholic  by  the  late 
King  Alfonso  XII.  of  Spain),  and  the  present  President  ot 
Liberia,  J.  Hilary  R.  W.  Johnson.  Another  great  Liberian 
is  Professor  Edward  W.  Blyden,  M.A.,  D.D.,  LL.D.,  who 
figured  as  a  Member  of  more  than  one  Liberian  Govern- 
ment. He  is  certainly  not  '  dull,  stupid  and  indolent' 
And  he  is  a  full-blooded  African. 

Though  thirty  years  have  not  elapsed  since  the  Africo- 
Americans  were  given  their  freedom,  they  have  produced 
such  men  as  E.  D.  Bassett,  J.  U.  Langston,  J.  E.  W. 
Thompson,  who  were  formerly  United  States  Ministers  to 
Hayti.  Would  such  men,  were  they  'dull,  stupid  and 
indolent,'  or  'in  mind  children,'  have  been  appointed 
Ministers  to  Hayti,  to  represent  a  great  Republic  like  that  of 
the  United  States  ?  Would  the  United  States  Government 
have  appointed  Frederick  Douglass,  the  present  Minister  of 
Hayti.  to  that  post  were  he  'dull,  stupid  and  indolent'? 
The  American  Government  appointed  these  four  men  to  the 
American  Ministership  of  Hayti  because  they  believed  they 
were  capable  men.  But  these  are  not  the  only  men  who 
have  come  forward  with  Africo- American  Emancipation. 
Pinchback,  Lieutenant-Governor  of  Louisiana  ;  B.  K.  Bruce, 
of  Mississippi ;  and  R.  B.  Elliott,  formerly  Members  of 
Congress;  the  Right  Reverend  H.  M.  Turner,  D.D.,  LL.D., 
of  Atlanta,  Georgia,  Bishop  of  the  Africo- American  Metho- 
dist Church,  who  was  in  1876  appointed  Vice-President  of 
the  American  Colonization  Society;  the  Right  Reverend 
Petre,  Bishop  of  the  Africo- American  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church,  are  all  prominent  men  who  have  come  to  the  front 
since  the  Emancipation.     These  ornaments  of  the  African- 


42  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Ethiopian  Race  are  not  '  dull,  stupid,  and  indolent,'  nor  '  in 
mind  children.'  They  are  '  affectionate,'  but  not  '  frivolous 
and  mischievous,'  nor  are  those  whom  we  have  previously 
enumerated  'frivolous  and  mischievous.'  Because  he  could 
not  bear  the  hardships  of  slavery,  and  because  his  brethren 
in  Canada  were  enjoying  the  boon  of  freedom  under  the 
Union  Jack,  young  Hawkins  fled  from  the  slaveholding 
South,  and  marched  to  Canada.  The  Right  Reverend 
gentleman,  Bishop  Walter  Hawkins,  of  the  Africo-British 
Methodist  Episcopal  Church  in  Canada,  who  escaped  from 
slavery,  is  a  full-blooded  African.  He  has  now  reached  the 
age  of  the  psalmist — the  hearty  and  hale  old  age  of  fourscore. 
There  are  twenty  thousand  Africans  in  Canada  belonging  to 
his  diocese.     He  is  a  genial  old  man,  and  pleasant-faced. 

The  race  which  can  produce  the  Honourable  Sir  William 
Conrad  Reeves,  Knt.,  Chief  Justice  of  the  Colony  of  Bar- 
badoes;  His  Worship  Hendrik  Vroom,  District  Commis- 
sioner of  Secondee,  in  the  Gold  Coast ;  His  Worship 
Augustus  William  Thompson,  District  Commissioner  of  the 
Gold  Coast ;  and  His  Worship  D.  B.  Yorke,  also  District 
Commissioner  in  the  same  Colony ;  the  Honourable  J.  R. 
Maxwell,  M.A.,  B.C.L.,  Chief  Magistrate  of  the  Gambia  ; 
His  Worship  L.  P.  Pierre,  Magistrate  of  Arima  and  Blan- 
chisseuse,  in  the  Colony  of  Trinidad  ;  with  but  fifty-three 
years  of  British  African  Emancipation,  argues  well  in  favour 
of  the  progress  the   African    has   made    and  is  making.* 

*  Mention  may  also  be  made  of  His  Honour  Francis  Smith, 
Puisne  Judge  of  the  Colony  of  Gold  Coast  ;  the  Honourable 
Charles  Pike,  C.M.G.,  Colonial  Treasurer  of  the  Colony 
of  Gold  Coast  ;  J.  H.  Spayne,  Colonial  Postmaster-General  of 
Sierra  Leone  ;  Roland  Cole,  Colonial  Postmaster-General  of 
Gold  Coast ;  J.  C.  Parkes,  Minister  for  Native  Affairs  in  the 
Colony  of  Sierra  Leone  ;  James  A.  McCarthy,  LL.B.,  Queen's 
Advocate  of  the  Colony  of  Sierra  Leone  ;  Archdeacon  Robbin, 
the  right-hand  man  and  able  lieutenant  of  the  white  Bishop  of 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  43 

This  shows  that  the  African  is  not  '  dull^  stupid,  and  in- 
dolent,' nor  is  he  '  in  mind  a  child,'  as  Laird  Clowes  would 
like  to  make  out.  If  these  men  were  'dull,  stupid,  and 
indolent,'  'in  mind  children,'  'frivolous  and  mischievous,' 
it  is  not  likely  that  the  British  Government  would  have 
honoured  them  with  their  suffrages  and  patronage ;  and 
even  if  we  could  suppose  that  they  had  degenerated  into 
those  weaknesses  since  they  received  their  respective 
appointments,  we  may  be  sure  that  they  would  have  been 
sent  about  their  business  by  the  British  Government  long 
since. 

Nor  have  we  Africans  '  stopped  short,'  producing  as  we 
do  still  similar  men  of  distinction.  That  the  African  is 
often  a  property-holder,  a  clergyman,  a  lawyer,  a  dentist,  a 
doctor .;  that  he  is  often  a  merchant,  an  engineer,  has 
medical  schools  and  colleges,  law  schools  and  colleges, 
theological  schools  and  colleges,  public  and  normal 
schools,  colleges  of  arts  and  sciences,  schools  for  secondary 
education,  and  commercial  schools  ;  that  he  is  often  a 
mechanic,  and  has  Reformed,  Episcopal,  Presbyterian, 
Methodist,  Baptist,  and  Roman  Catholic  churches  and 
chapels — all  testify  that  the  African  is  not  '  dull,  stupid, 
and  indolent,'  but  is  progressive,  and,  moreover,  marching 


Sierra  Leone,  the  Right  Rev.  Ernest  Graham  Ingham,  D.D. ; 
Archdeacon  Crowther  ;  Dr.  Esmon,  Senior  Assistant-Surgeon  of 
the  Colony  of  Gold  Coast ;  Drs.  J.  S.  Smith  and  Papafio, 
Assistant-Surgeons  of  the  Gold  Coast  Colony;  Dr.  Wm.  Renner, 
Senior  Assistant- Surgeon  of  Sierra  Leone  Colony  ;  Dr.  Garrett, 
Assistant  Colonial  Surgeon  of  Sierra  Leone ;  Drs.  J.  Rendell  and 
O.  Johnson,  Assistant  Colonial  Surgeons  of  Lagos  ;  Charles 
Barnes,  Colonial  Engineer  and  Assistant  Surveyor  of  the  Gold 
Coast ;  O.  Morre,  a  Professor,  and  the  Principal  of  the  Colonial 
Grammar  School  of  Sierra  Leone  ;  the  Honourable  Samuel 
Lewis,  Syble  Boyle  and  T.  J.  Sawyer,  Members  of  the  Legis  - 
lative  Council  of  Sierra  Leone,  and  others. 


44  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

on  to  claim  equality  with  other  races.  These  are  recognised 
and  admitted  facts. 

But  what  says  Laird  Clowes?  On  page  76  are  these 
words  :  '  The  black  stops  short,  and  is  dull,  stupid,  and  in- 
dolent, as  well  as  frivolous  and  mischievous,  and  in  mind  a 
child.'  This  we  have  sufficiently  refuted  ;  but,  on  page  116 
of  his  '  Black  America,'  does  he  contradict  himself  or  con- 
firm his  previous  statement  ?  He  says  :  '  Educationally  the 
Coloured  man'  (z>.,  the  African)  'has  undoubtedly  made 
great  progress  since  his  Emancipation.  In  the  slavery 
days  ignorance  was  imposed  by  law  upon  the  slave.'  We 
take  it  that  as  the  'African  has  undoubtedly  made  great 
progress  since  his  Emancipation,'  he  cannot  have  '  stopped 
short,'  nor  is  he  '  dull,  stupid,  and  indolent,'  especially  when 
we  know  that  '  in  the  slavery  days  ignorance  was  imposed 
by  law  upon  the  slave.'  Why  should  Laird  Clowes  confuse 
his  readers  ?  why  does  he  not  say  what  he  means  ?  Why 
does  he  say  one  thing  on  one  page  (76),  and,  apparently, 
another  thing  on  another  page  (116)  ? 

Again,  there  is  another  way  of  showing  that  we  Africans 
have  not  '  stopped  short,'  and  are  not  '  dull,  stupid,  and 
indolent.'  We  argue  from  the  fact  that,  though  the  sun  of 
sixty  years  of  Emancipation  has  not  yet  set  over  our  heads, 
we  are  already  permitted  to  marry  our  rulers ;  surely  that 
speaks  volumes.  Such  a  thing  could  not  have  happened 
in  the  slavery  days ;  but  it  does  happen  to-day.  '  There 
was  a  time  when  such  a  thing  was  not  heard  of  There 
is  a  secret  behind  this  fact ;  we  suspect  it  is  the  growing 
appreciation  which  the  white  Juliet  has  for  the  African 
Romeo,  as  he  becomes  more  and  more  intelligent  and 
educated  and  refined.'  The  Romans  entertained  the 
greatest  antipathy  to  intermarriage  with  their  British  sub- 
jects, on  account  of  their  inferiority,  and  their  tendency  to 
retrogradation ;  but  Caucasians,  and  more  particularly  the 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  45 

leading  Caucasian  races,  i.e.,  the  Saxon  and  the  Gallic, 
intermarry  with  Africans  who  are  black — yes,  black,  it  is 
true,  but  '  black  and  comely.'  And  if  proof  were  required 
to  show  that  black  is  as  good  a  colour  for  humanity  as  the 
white,  surely  the  fact  that  the  whites,  who  are  the  ruling 
race,  marry  their  black  subjects,  proves  it,  and  speaks 
volumes  for  the  African.  The  British,  moreover,  did  not 
produce  one  single  learned  man  when  they  were  under  the 
Roman  rule,  from  the  time  of  the  landing  of  Julius  Caesar, 
in  the  year  55  b.c,  up  to  the  year,  say,  650  a.d.,  when 
England  was  under  the  rule  of  the  third  Bretwalda,  King 
Ethelbert  of  Kent — that  is,  a  period  covering  705  years. 
The  earliest  writer  was  Gildas  of  Dumbarton,  a  Scotchman, 
but  the  earliest  English  writer,  Casdmon  of  Whitby,  did 
not  write  until  several  years  after  Gildas  of  Dumbarton. 

But  Africans  have  been  far  quicker  in  taking  advantage 
of  civilization  than  the  British  were,  yet  we  do  not  call  the 
British  '  dull,  stupid,  and  indolent.' 

Speaking  under  the  heading  of  his  so-called  '  Ideal 
Solution,'  Laird  Clowes  (page  199)  says  :  'One  of  the  most 
conspicuous  characteristics  of  the  Negro  is,  as  I  have 
already  had  to  point  out,  his  childishness.  Referring  to 
the  Negroes  of  Africa,  Mr.  H.  M.  Stanley,  writing  in 
December  last  (1890)  to  the  Titnes,  said  :  "  If  one  regards 
these  natives  as  mere  brutes,  then  the  same  annoyances 
that  their  follies  and  vices  inflict  are,  indeed,  intolerable. 
In  order  to  rule  them,  and  to  keep  one's  life  amongst  them, 
it  is  needful  resolutely  to  regard  them  as  children,  who 
require,  indeed,  different  methods  of  rule  from  English  or 
American  citizens,  but  who  must  be  ruled  in  precisely  the 
same  spirit,  with  the  same  absence  of  caprice  and  anger, 
the  same  essential  respect  to  our  fellow-men." 

'  Another  recent  writer  has  said  of  them  (the  Negroes) : 
"  They  are  children — children  naughty  or  children  good ; 


46  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

pleased  or   angry ;    children    to   be  ruled   firmly,    treated 
kindly — but  always  at  bottom  children." ' 

With  regard  to  the  latter  part  of  Mr.  Clowes's  quotation, 
i.e.,  his  quotation  of  'Another  recent  writer 'on  the  childish- 
ness of  the  African,  the  author  of  '  Black  America '  is 
prudent  enough  to  conceal  the  identity  of  this  '  Another 
recent  writer,'  and  consequently  we  are  quite  in  the  dark 
as  to  his  status,  and  as  to  his  qualification  thus  to  give  an 
opinion  of  the  Africans.  We  therefore,  as  a  matter  of 
course,  ignore  the  opinion  of  this  'Another  recent  writer,' 
which  is  valueless  until  we  can  measure  the  extent  of  his 
knowledge  and  authority.  But  have  we  not  in  the  pre- 
ceding pages  sufficiently  shown  to  Laird  Clowes,  or  anyone 
else,  that  the  African  is  not  childish,  if  this  word  refers  to 
the  mental  ability  of  the  race  } 

With  H.  M.  Stanley,  however,  we  must  deal;  and  we 
shall  endeavour  to  show  that  Stanley's  opinion  of  the 
Africans  counts  for  very  little,  and  is  not  to  be  trusted, 
because  he  has  a  bad  record,  and  is  therefore  disqualified 
from  speaking  authoritatively  on  the  qualities  of  the  race 
which  he  has  thought  fit  thus  to  libel.  And  we  shall  show 
that  he  has  a  bad  record,  as  far  as  the  Africans  are  con- 
cerned, in  two  ways.  In  the  first  place,  Stanley  ill-treated 
the  Africans  in  Africa :  it  is  the  very  Africans  who  were  his 
victims  whom  he  has  thought  fit  maliciously  to  libel.  In 
the  next  place,  Stanley,  with  the  Emin  Pasha  Relief 
Expedition,  plunged  into  the  heart  of  the  forest  and  the 
desert  of  Africa  with  such  alacrity  and  perseverance,  not 
from  zealous  philanthropy  or  for  scientific  purposes,  but 
for  political  purposes.  Stanley  was  only  too  evidently 
actuated  by  desire  for  fame,  and  perhaps  for  wealth. 

The  disgraceful  dispute  about  the  Rear-guard  horrors, 
which  began  immediately  after  Stanley's  triumphal  entry 
into  Britain,  after  his  being  dined  and  feted  on  an  extensive 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  47 

scale ;  after  he  had  received  the  patronage  of  Oxford  and 
Cambridge,  and  the  freedom  and  degrees  of  their  respective 
Universities ;  and,  in  brief,  after  he  had  been  made  much 
of — fairly  took  the  world  by  surprise,  and  certainly  scandal- 
ized it.  When  the  cannibal  stories,  and  Stanley's  other 
misdeeds,  were  first  bruited  about,  a  loud  howl  of  indigna- 
tion was  raised,  not  only  throughout  the  length  and  breadth 
of  the  United  Kingdom,  but  also  throughout  France. 
Germany  echoed  it.  Russia  echoed  it ;  as  did  Austria, 
Hungary,  and  Italy.  The  greater  part  of  the  United 
States  of  America  were  not  a  whit  behindhand,  but  they  also 
echoed  it.  The  public,  and  the  newspaper  press  of  Britain, 
loudly  denounced  Stanley  in  his  capacity  of  chief  of  the 
'  Emin  Pasha  Relief  Expedition,'  and  said  that  he  was 
responsible,  as  such,  for,  first,  the  cruelties  perpetrated  by 
the  commanding  officer  (Major  Barttelot)  of  his  Rear-guard 
at  Yambuya  Camp ;  and,  secondly,  for  neglecting  to  leave 
medicine,  and  sufficient  and  proper  provisions,  for  the 
Africans  who  composed  Stanley's  Guard. 

Mr.  Stanley,  though  he  well  knew  Major  Barttelot's 
character,  his  nervous  irritability  and  great  w^ant  of  self- 
control,  and  his  unconquerable  hate  for  the  Africans ;  and 
though  he  knew  well  that  he  was  about  to  plunge  further 
into  the  interior  of  the  African  Continent  with  his  advance- 
guard,  and  expected  to  be  away  for  five  months,  did  not 
hesitate  to  leave  the  Africans  of  his  rear-guard  just  as  if 
they  were  so  many  brutes,  under  the  care  of  a  man  with  an 
ungovernable  temper,  whose  irreconcilable  hatred  for  the 
natives  under  his  command  was  notorious.  Major  Bartte- 
lot was  left  at  Yambuya  with  unlimited  powers  by  Stanley, 
while  the  latter  plunged  into  the  interior  and  absented  him- 
self for  ten  months.  We  may  well  imagine  how  terrible 
must  have  been  the  sufferings  of  the  Africans  for  those  ten 
long    months   under   the   tyrannical   and    despotic    Major 


48  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Barttelot.     It  is,  however,  best  to  let  the  European  speak 
of  his  fellow-Europeans  ;  the  Britisher,  of  his  British  fellow- 
countrymen  ;  the  officer,  of  his  brother  officers.     And  no 
man  is  better  qualified  to  speak  of  Major  Barttelot  and  his 
atrocities,  or  of  Stanley's  '  Emin  Pasha  Relief  Expedition,' 
and  its  doings,  than  Lieutenant  Troup,   one  of  the  chief 
officers  of  that  Expedition.     And  this  is  what  he  says  of 
Barttelot  as  well    as  of   Stanley :    '  I    admit   that   certain 
things  were  done  which  I  would  not  have  done  ;  but  it 
must    be   remembered    that    Major    Barttelot   was   quick- 
tempered and  nervous,  and  had    no  control  over  himself. 
He  was  unquestionably  the  wrong  man  to  place  in  control 
of  the  natives,  no  matter  how  large  a  force  there  might  be. 
The  Major  hated  the  natives,  and  made  no  effort  to  conceal 
his  dislike  for  them.     He  had  never  had  any  experience  in 
the  jungle,  and  really  did   not  know  how  to  manage  the 
natives  even   if  he  had   had  the  will.      Mr.  Stanley  knew 
intimately  just  what  kind  of  a  man  Major  Barttelot  was ; 
and  if  there  was  a  blunder,  Stanley  was  entirely  responsible 
for  having  placed  such  a  man  in  control  of  the  Rear-guard.' 
This  is  what  every  sensible  man  recognises.     On  another 
occasion,  Lieutenant  Troup,  speaking  to  an  interviewer  at 
Boston,     Massachusetts,    U.   S.    America,     thus   expressed 
himself :    '  I   admit   Major    Barttelot's  cruelty.       I   am  re- 
turning to  England  to-morrow.     If  Mr.  Stanley  is  going  to 
bring   an    action    against    Major    Barttelot's    brother,   and 
against  the  surviving  officers  of  the  expedition,  I  suppose  I 
will  be  included.     That  will  suit  me  immensely  ;  for  then  I 
will  have  a  chance  to  cross-examine.     I  am  not  afraid  to 
have  my  record  laid   bare  by  the  most  searching  investiga- 
tion,   and    Mr.  Stanley  must    understand   that    he    is    the 
accuser,  not  I.     I  said  nothing  about  the  disasters  to  the 
rear-column  until  he  drove  me  to  the  wall,  and  forced  me 
to  defend  my  reputation  from  the  false  and  unjust  accusa- 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  49 

tions  he  made;  but  if  Mr.  Stanley  thought  he  could  in- 
timidate me  he  made  a  great  mistake.  I  did  not  say  a  word 
against  Mr.  Stanley  or  Major  Barttelot  until  somebody  first 
made  charges ;  and  I  say  again  that  I  believe  Mr.  Stanley 
was  primarily  responsible  for  the  fate  of  the  poor  fellows 
{i.e.,  the  poor  Africans)  at  Yarabuya  Camp:  first,  on  account 
of  his  (Stanley's)  poor  judgment  in  the  selection  of  a  com- 
manding officer  ;  and,  second,  by  his  neglecting  to  provide 
sufficient  food  and  supplies  in  case  of  emergency.  This 
emergency  was  Mr.  Stanley's  delay  in  returning  to  Yam- 
buya  Camp.  He  promised  to  return  in  five  months,  and 
made  provision  for  only  five  months.  This  was  almost 
criminal  negligence.'  We  think  it  was  'criminal  negli- 
gence '  when  Stanley  neglected  *  to  leave  proper  provision 
for  the  Black  men.'  It  was  also  'criminal  negligence,' 
on  the  part  of  Stanley  to  fail  in  providing  medicines,  so 
that  '  when,'  to  quote  Lieutenant  Troup,  '  the  Blacks  were 
ill  there  was  no  medicine,  thanks  to  Stanley,'  as  well  as 
when  'no  medicine  was  sent  from  the  camp'  of  the 
advance-guard  to  the  Africans.  To  use  again  the  language 
of  Lieutenant  Troup,  '  when  ten  months  had  passed,  and 
Stanley  had  not  returned,  the  people  {i.e.,  the  Africans), 
whom  he  had  left  behind  with  barely  food  enough  for  five 
months,  were  in  a  starving  condition.' 

Britishers  were  not  alone  in  their  denunciation  of  Stanley 
for  his  direct  and  indirect  ill-treatment  of  the  Africans. 
The  French  Journal  des  D'ebats  of  November  12,  1890, 
commenting  upon  the  Rear-guard  scandals,  says :  '  It 
is  necessary  in  the  dilemma  to  decide  whether  Major 
Barttelot  and  Mr.  Jameson  were  guilty  of  the  cruelties  im- 
puted to  them — and  everyone  is  free  to  excuse  the  sorry 
courage  of  Mr.  Stanley  in  saying  so — or  whether  they  were 
not  guilty.  In  the  latter  case,  there  is  no  possible  allow- 
ance to  be  made  for  Mr.  Stanley,  and  his  charges  constitute 

4 


50  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

a  calumny,  the  responsibility  of  which  he  bears,  and  which 
becomes  an  act  more  perverse  than  man  has  ever  com- 
mitted.'     Indeed,  it   is    a  matter   of  common  knowledge, 
that  such  was  the  indignation  felt  in  France,  as  in  Russia, 
against    Stanley,    because    of    his    ill-treatment    of    the 
Africans,  that  Frenchmen  and  Russians  of  all  shades  of 
opinion  unanimously  said  that  they,  from  the  moment  it 
was  first  bruited  about  that  Stanley  was   on  the  point  of 
plunging  into  the  heart  of  that  Land  of  Mystery — Africa — 
for  exploring  and  philanthropic  purposes,  and  in  quest  and 
relief  of  Emin  Pasha  (who    wished  neither  to  be  sought 
after  nor  relieved,  for  he  was  safe  and  sound),  suspected 
that  he  (Stanley)  was  bent  on  a  politico-filibustering  and 
trading  mission.      Stanley's  philanthropy  in  the  cause  of 
humanity  was  scouted  to  the  winds  and  derided,  so  much 
so  that,  when  an  influential  and  largely  attended  meeting 
was  held  at  the  Mansion  House,  about  December,  1890,  to 
protest  against  the  persecution  of  the  Jews  in  Russia,  and 
to  send  a  memorial  to  the  Russian  Emperor,  respectfully 
and   humbly  requesting  him  to   repeal,    or   otherwise  use 
his  influence  to  repeal,  the  new  and  severe  laws  operating 
against  the  Czar's  Hebrew  subjects,  whereby  the  observers 
of  the  Law  of  Moses  were  plunged  into  the  greatest  dis- 
tress, the  Russians  indignantly,  but  justly,  declared   that 
Britishers  would  be  more  profitably  occupied  if  they  gave 
their  due  attention  to  removing  the  stain  cast  upon  their 
reputation  by  the  scandals  originating  from  the  doings,  or 
rather  the  misdoings,  of  Stanley  and  his   piratical   Rear- 
guard  column   in  Central   Africa.     And   the   semi-official 
journal,  the  Novoye  Vremya,  it  is  on  record,  furiously  but 
truly  said :  '  This  concern  for  the  Jews  on  the  part  of  the 
Enghsh,   who   have   impoverished   fertile    Hindostan    and 
Egypt,   who  are  poisoning  the  population  of  China  with 
opium,   who   have   annihilated    the   native   population   of 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  51 

Australia  {i.e.,  the  Australian  Africans)  just  as  if  they  were 
vermin,  and  who  now^  under  the  pretext  of  putting  an  end 
to  the  slave-trade,  are  exterminating  in  the  most  savage 
manner  numerous  tribes  of  Africa,  is  extremely  touching. 
Who  is  not  aware  of  the  value  of  English  philanthropy  !' 

This  is  how  Stanley  in  the  first  place  ill-treated  the 
Africans.  But  it  is  for  us  to  show  that,  in  the  next 
place,  Stanley  had  otherwise  a  bad  record  when  he 
marched  into  Africa  for  political  and  mercenary  ends, 
though  giving  out  that  he  was  bent  on  African  exploration 
in  the  interests  of  humanity.  Let  his  own  countryman,  and 
one  of  Stanley's  right-hand  men  in  the  Stanley  politico- 
filibustering  expedition  into  Africa,  speak.  Lieutenant 
Troup  thus  disburdens  himself:  'Mr.  Stanley  is  a  great 
explorer,  but  he  went  into  this  Emin  Pasha  Relief  Expedi- 
tion for  fame,  and  what  he  could  get  out  of  it.  He  has  no 
more  philanthropy  than  my  boot.  I  will  go  further,  and 
say  that  the  expedition  was  in  the  nature  of  a  speculation, 
and  not  a  philanthropic  relief  movement.  The  capitalists 
backing  it  were  after  the  ivory  which  Emin  Pasha  was 
supposed  to  have  collected.  The  officers  (including  Lieu- 
tenant Troup)  of  the  Expedition  were  promised  certain 
shares  in  the  expected  big  supply  of  ivory  as  a  reward  for 
their  services.  The  release  of  Emin  Pasha  was  a  secondary 
consideration  entirely.  Emin  Pasha  did  not  wish  to  be 
released.  He  had  been  up  there  ten  or  twelve  years,  and 
held  his  own  to,  at  any  rate,  his  own  satisfaction. 

'These  facts  explain  the  entire  situation  ;  and  the 
Expedition  must  necessarily  lose  some  of  the  glamour  which 
surrounds  it,  when  it  is  known  that  greed  for  fame  and 
riches,  instead  of  humanity,  prompted  the  movement.' 

This  statement,  coming  as  it  does  from  one  of  Stanley's 
chief  officers,  cannot  fail  to  carry  the  greatest  weight,  and 
helps  to  show  up  the  sort  of  man  that  Henry  M.  Stanley 

4—2 


52  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

is.  Many  of  the  individual  States  composing  the  American 
Union  positively  refused  to  see  and  hear  Stanley  when  that 
gentleman  proposed  journeying  on  a  lecturing  tour  in  those 
States.  Texas  especially  was  loud  and  active  in  its  denun- 
ciation of  him,  refused  to  hear  his  lectures,  and  challenged 
Mr.  Stanley  to  cleanse  his  reputation  of  its  stain. 

Germany  not  only  condemned  Stanley  for  his  misdeeds 
in  Africa,  and  gave  out  that  he  went  on  a  politico-filibuster- 
ing and  mercenary  mission,  but  took  care  to  add  that  Emin 
Pasha  did  not  wish  to  be  rescued,  because  he  had  been  for 
years  safe  and  secure  in  his  Province  of  Equatoria. 

Dr.  Carl  Peters,  a  German,  and  one  of  the  Pasha's  right- 
hand  men  in  Equatoria,  writing  in  the  Contemporary 
Review  for  November,  1890,  says:  'What  I  am  about  to 
publish  now  was  told  me  at  Upwapwa  by  Emin  Pasha 
himself,  with  the  understanding  that  I  should  be  permitted 
to  publish  it.  According  to  what  Emin  told  me,  the  first 
time  Stanley  arrived  at  the  Mwata  Nzige  he  was  in  an 
almost  ruined  condition.  When  Stanley  arrived  at  the 
Mwata  Nzige  for  the  second  time,  he  -at  once  announced 
to  the  Pasha  that  he  had  with  him  orders  from  the  Khedive 
to  evacuate  the  Equatorial  province.  The  Khedive,  he 
said,  wished  to  give  up  the  whole  Soudan,  and  could  not 
allow  any  longer  that  one  of  his  Governors  should  main- 
tain himself  on  the  Upper  Nile.  This  communication, 
made  by  Stanley,  cannot  fail  to  appear  strange — the  more 
so  that  it  was  in  direct  opposition  to  the  interests  of  civiliza- 
tion and  European  politics,  the  only  motives  which  had 
ostensibly  led  to  Stanley's  expedition.  Stanley,  by  making 
himself  the  carrier  of  a  message,  doing  away  with  all  the 
work  of  civilization  on  the  Upper  Nile,  was  working  for 
barbarism  in  general,  and  for  Mahdism  in  particular.  If  it 
was  intended  to  open  up  Central  Africa  to  European  civili- 
zation,  the   first   thing   to   do  was   to   strengthen  Emin's 


i 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  53 


I 

^^osition  in  Equatoria,  not  to  abolish  it.  What  interest 
could  Europe,  and  especially  England,  have  in  removing 
this  last  stronghold  of  a  higher  civilization?  The  Emin 
Pasha  Relief  Expedition  had  been  organized  in  Europe, 
not  so  much  in  order  to  save  the  person  of  Emin  as  in 
order  to  strengthen  the  bearer  of  European  civilization  and 
culture  and  political  influence  on  the  Upper  Nile.  I  must 
say  that  in  this  proposition  as  made  to  Emin  there  is  some- 
thing quite  unintelligible  ;  nor  can  I  help  thinking  that  it  was 
made  for  the  purpose  only  of  rendering  Emin  Pasha  more 
willing  to  accept  the  propositions  to  be  made  afterwards.' 

Continuing,  Carl  Peters  says  the  Pasha  told  him  that : 
'  After  several  days,  while  I  was  considering  Stanley's  first 
proposition,  he  surprised  me  with  a  second  one.  It  was 
just  the  reverse  of  the  first  one,  but  that  did  not  prevent 
Stanley  from  bringing  along  both  of  them  in  his  pocket.' 

'  In  the  name  of  the  King  of  the  Belgians  Stanley  requested 
Emin  not  to  obey  the  Khedive's  orders,  not  to  evacuate 
Equatoria,  but  to  hoist  there  the  flag  of  the  Congo  Free 
State.  If  he  would  do  so,  the  King  would  make  him  his 
Governor-General  for  that  district,  and  would  grant  him 
;^i,ooo  per  month  for  the  expenses  of  the  administration 
of  the  district.  As  to  Emin's  personal  interest,  he  was 
asked  to  name  his  figure,  and  was  told  in  advance  that  it 
would  be  granted.  But  Stanley,  said  Emin,  very  soon  after- 
wards told  him  that  he  did  not  advise  him  to  accept  that 
proposition.  The  Congo  Free  State,  he  said,  was  in  a  bad 
state  of  confusion,  and  Emin  could  plainly  see  how  he 
(Stanley)  had  been  treated  by  the  King  of  the  Belgians.  It 
was  only  several  days  later  that  Stanley  came  out  with  his 
real  plan,  the  third  proposition,  which  again  stood  in  direct 
opposition  to  the  two  former  ones.  In  the  name  of  the 
British  East  African  Company  he  proposed  to  Emin  to  go 
round  the  Victoria  Nyanza  to  its  north-east  corner,  to  Kavi- 


54  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

rondo.  There  Emin  was  to  be  established  on  an  island, 
and  left  to  fortify  his  position.  Stanley  would  then  hurry 
for  the  coast,  and  go  to  Mombasa  to  raise  ammunition  and 
troops  for  Emin.  The  British  East  African  Company  was 
to  take  the  whole  army  of  Emin  into  its  service,  every  man 
with  the  rank  and  pay  he  possessed  while  under  Egyptian 
rule.  Emin  Pasha  was  to  be  Governor  under  the  Company 
of  all  lands  in  the  Upper  Nile.  As  for  his  salary,  that  was 
to  be  settled  by  him  with  the  Company.  Stanley  brought 
forward  a  contract  with  that  Company,  stamped  and  sealed 
in  London,  and  only  needing  Emin's  signature  to  make  it 
perfect.  Finally  ^3,000  was  agreed  upon  as  the  salary. 
The  troops  which  Stanley  was  to  bring  back  from  Mombasa 
were  to  restore  the  Christians  to  Uganda  under  the  leader- 
ship of  Emin,  fight  Unyoro,  and  then  reoccupy  Emin's  old 
province,  all  this  to  be  achieved  in  the  name  of  the  British 
East  African  Company.  Stanley,  after  having  brought  up 
these  auxiliary  troops  for  Emin,  was  then  to  withdraw  and 
go  off  to  England.  Of  course,  the  pliability  of  Stanley,  who 
was  himself  the  bearer  of  three  messages  or  propositions 
whereof  any  one,  by  its  nature,  excluded  the  possibility  of 
even  considering  the  other  two,  was  somewhat  confusing ; 
but  however  that  might  be,  Emin  Pasha,  with  a  heavy 
heart  and  under  the  force  of  circumstances,  made  up  his 
mind  to  accept  the  third  offer.  Then  a  part  of  his  people, 
who  would  not  quit  their  homes  on  the  Nile,  which  had 
become  dear  to  them,  mutinied,  and  refused  to  proceed. 
Stanley  and  Emin  Pasha,  however,  left  the  district  and 
advanced  on  the  west  side  of  the  lake.  When  camping  at 
Busagala,  west-south-west  of  Uganda,  they  received  the 
messengers  of  the  Christian  King  Mwanga,  imploring  their 
help  against  the  Arab  party.  The  chief  of  this  Uganda 
mission  was  a  certain  Marco,  who,  later,  spent  two  months 
in  my  camp  and  in  my  immediate  neighbourhood,  and  to 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  55 

whom  I  owe  several  details  regarding  Stanley's  departure. 
Stanley  refused  to  help  the  Christians,  remarking  "  that  he 
was  too  weak  for  such  an  undertaking."  It  was  then,'  the 
learned  Doctor  proceeded,  '  that  Emin  Pasha  offered  to  go 
to  Uganda  alone  with  his  own  people,  if  Stanley  would 
permit  it.  But  Stanley  had  Emin  Pasha  put  under  watch, 
and  threatened  to  proceed  against  him  by  force  should  he 
attempt  to  carry  out  that  idea. 

'  As  for  Stanley,  having  reached  the  south  end  of  the 
Victoria  Nyanza,  at  Usumbiro,  he  could  not  make  up  his 
mind  to  carry  out  the  promise  held  out  to  Emin,  viz.,  to 
bring  him  around  the  east  coast  of  the  lake  to  Kavirondo, 
and  establish  him  there  as  agreed.  He  (Stanley)  suddenly 
declared  himself  unable  to  do  so  without  an  express  order 
of  the  Queen  of  England.  Emin  understood  then  that  he 
had  been  taken  out  of  his  own  country  under  pretences  or 
promises  not  to  be  realized  afterwards.  He  had  lost  what 
he  possessed,  and  now  was  forced,  against  his  inclination, 
to  accompany  Stanley  to  the  coast.  As  a  matter  of  course, 
cordial  relations  could  not  exist  between  the  two  parties 
under  such  circumstances. 

'  I  shall  not  personally  take  part  against  Stanley,  but  in 
the  interest  of  truth  I  must  add,  that  what  I  heard  about 
Stanley's  personal  behaviour,  not  from  Emin,  but  from  the 
missionaries  on  the  Nyanza,  could  not  diminish  the  naturally 
bad  feeling  between  the  two  parties.  One  day  two  Catholic 
missionaries  came  from  Ukumbi  to  Usumbiro  to  pay  their 
respects  to  Emin.  They  found  the  whole  party  at  dinner, 
Stanley  at  the  head  of  the  table,  with  a  half-bottle  of  wine,  and 
served  in  European  fashio/t,  but  all  others  at  the  same  table 
without  wine,  and  living  on  "  Negro  "  fare.  Such  a  glimpse 
of  the  social  intercourse  among  the  members  of  the  expe- 
dition speaks  volumes,  and  it  would  be  perfectly  useless  for 
me  to  add  a  single  word.     I  am  not  at  all  surprised  that 


56  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Stanley  should  speak  contemptuously  of  Emin  Pasha.  The 
two  men  were  too  different  to  understand  one  another.  I 
believe  Stanley  lacks  the  organ  necessary  to  appreciate  a 
deHcate  and  sensitive  character  like  that  of  Emin  Pasha, 
just  as  a  man  with  a  bad  cold  is  unable  to  enjoy  the  beauty 
of  a  field  of  roses,  but  the  beauty  exists  nevertheless.  To 
me  (Carl  Peters)  Emin  Pasha  appears  as  a  model  in  the 
faithful  performance  of  duty,  and  in  the  seriousness  of  his 
scientific  labours  and  his  moral  tact. 

'  The  fact  of  his  not  caring  to  go  to  Europe,'  concludes 
the  worthy  Doctor,  '  to  be  feasted  and  honoured  like  others, 
is  proof  enough  of  genuine  modesty  and  candour  of  principle, 
as  is  also  the  fact  that  he  refrained  from  taking  ;£3,ooo  to 
enter  the  British  service,  not,  however,  mainly  from  national 
feelings,  for  he  had  been  willing  to  take  service  with  the 
British,  but  because  his  innermost  feelings  had  been  hurt  by 
Stanley's  behaviour  towards  him.' 

Now,  the  man  who  has  cruelly  ill-treated  the  Africans, 
both  indirectly  and  directly,  not  only  by  his  appointment  of 
Major  Barttelot  in  command  over  them  at  Yambuya  Camp, 
with  extraordinary  and  unlimited  powers  for  ten  months, 
well  knowing  the  Major's  brutality  and  bad  temper,  and  his 
unconquerable  hate  for  the  Africans  ;  but  also  by  leaving 
the  blacks  without  a  sufficiency  of  provisions  for  five  months, 
and  without  any  at  all  for  another  five  months,  and  still 
more  by  leaving  no  medicine  for  the  Africans  in  case  of 
sickness  for  ten  months,  and  even  by  cruelly  and  shamefully 
ill-treating  the  Africans,  shooting  them  down  (for  he  did  do 
that)  wholesale,  for  little  or  no  fault  whatever,  just  as  if  they 
were  '  mere  brutes  ' — this  man  ventures  to  come  forward  with 
daring  defamatory  statements  on  his  lips,  and  to  say  that 
the  Africans  are  'mere  brutes,'  and  that  'it  is  needful 
resolutely  to  regard  them  as  children.'  Because  Stanley 
regarded  these  African   natives  as  'mere  brutes'  and   as 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  57 

'  children,'  he  ill-treated  them,  permitted  Major  Barttelot  to 
shoot  them  as  well  as  flog  them  without  mercy ;  because 
Stanley  regarded  the  Africans  as  '  mere  brutes '  and  as 
*  children,'  he  left  them  with  an  insufficiency  of  provisions 
for  five  months,  and  without  any  at  all  for  another  five 
months  ;  because  Stanley  regarded  these  same  Africans  as 
'  mere  brutes  '  and  as  '  children,'  he  left  them  to  perish  of 
disease  for  ten.  months  without  medicine ;  because  Stanley 
regarded  the  blacks  as  '  mere  brutes  '  and  as  '  children,'  he 
massacred  them  by  reason  of  the  '  annoyances '  they 
brought  on  him  through  '  their  follies  and  vices.' 

We  have  already  said  that  Stanley  was  unanimously 
denounced  by  British,  French,  Russian,  and  German  public 
opinion,  and  by  the  newspaper  press,  and  to  a  great  extent 
also  by  the  voice  of  the  American  people,  and  we  have,  more- 
over, given  the  opinions  of  Troup  and  Peters,  as  well  as  those 
of  Emin  Pasha.  Stanley  has  not  yet  thought  fit  to  demand  a 
trial  of  his  conduct  when  in  '  Darkest  Africa,'  as  every 
honourable  man  in  his  position  would  have  done.  We 
therefore  say — and  the  reader,  we  are  sanguine,  will  bear  us 
out — that  it  does  not  lie  with  Stanley  to  express  any  opinion 
of  the  Natives  whom  he  ill-treated,  and  even  massacred,  and 
towards  whom  he  was  guilty  of  criminal  negligence.  We 
should  think  a  second  time,  if  we  were  Mr.  Clowes,  before 
we  borrowed  Stanley's  expressed  opinion  of  the  Africans, 
after  we  had  heard  the  scandals  associated  with  Stanley's 
name  and  with  the  doings  of  his  Rear-guard  in  Central  Africa. 
We  should  hesitate  the  more  seeing  that  the  man,  after 
being  repeatedly  challenged  and  invited  to  institute  what 
Stanley,  as  plaintiff,  would  call  libel  proceedings  against 
eminent  and  philanthropic  Britishers  and  the  British  press, 
has  not  thought  fit  to  redeem  his  sullied  reputation  from  the 
foul  stigma  cast  upon  it.  If  Stanley  wants  to  speak  with 
authority  on  the  qualities  of  the  Africans  in  Africa,  he  must 


58  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

come  with  clean  hands,  and  not  with  a  bad  record,  such  as 
we  have  described,  and  add  his  insults  to  the  Africans  whom 
he  has  injured. 

What  a  striking  contrast  Stanley  presents  to  Chinese 
Gordon,  the  British  hero  who  died  at  Khartoum  !  Stanley 
went  to  Africa,  as  Troup  says,  for  fame,  riches,  and  the 
acquisition  of  ivory.  The  simple  and  gentle-minded 
Gordon  went  to  Africa,  not  for  fame,  because  he  was  very 
modest  and  indifferent  to  praise  or  reward,  but  in  the 
interest  of  humanity  ;  not  for  riches  and  ivory,  for  it  is  a 
matter  of  ommon  knowledge  that  Chinese  Gordon  had  the 
greatest  contempt  for  money  and  wealth,  but  to  give  freedom 
to  his  African  fellow-men,  and  to  check  slavery  and  the 
slave  trade.  Stanley  destroyed  as  many  Africans  as  possible, 
and  robbed  the  African  chieftains  and  their  clansmen  ;  but 
the  sympathetic  Chinese  Gordon  protected  as  many 
Africans  as  he  possibly  could,  and  spared  as  many  lives  as 
circumstances  permitted,  and  did  not  rob  the  Soudanese. 
Stanley  returned  to  Europe  and  to  Britain  a  very  wealthy 
man,  and  was  received  at  first  in  triumph  and  with  open 
arms,  though  afterwards  he  was  shown  the  cold  shoulder 
by  many ;  but  Chinese  Gordon  remained  in  Africa  and  the 
Soudan,  and  when  the  Mahommedan  soldiers  carried  the 
capital  of  the  Egyptian  Soudan  by  assault  at  the  point  of 
the  spear,  Chinese  Gordon,  the  hero,  earned  the  martyr's 
crown  by  perishing  among  the  people  whom  his  philan- 
throphy  had  freed  in  Khartoum  ;  and  there  he,  the  white 
man,  the  European  and  the  Britisher,  found  a  common 
grave  with  the  black  man,  the  African  and  the  Soudanese, 
revered  by  all  men  in  his  death.  Institutions  and  memorials 
were  raised,  and  statues  erected  in  his  honour.  Chinese 
Gordon  is  kindly  remembered  by  his  nation,  but  that  same 
nation  looks  suspiciously  on  Stanley,  whose  reputation  is,  for 
many  of  his  fellow-Britishers,  under  a  cloud. 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  59 

Having  sufficiently  confronted  Stanley,  and  shown  up 
what  the  man  and  his  opinion  are  worth,  we  now  pass  on  to 
foes  worthier  of  our  steel. 

We  must  refer  the  reader  to  page  168  of  Black  America,' 
in  which  Laird  Clowes  summarizes  an  article  Mr.  Cone  con- 
tributed to  Belford's  Magazine  for  September,  1889,  a  part 
of  which  summary  runs  thus  :  '  The  cases  of  Hayti  and 
Jamaica  are  cited  to  prove  that  the  black  man,  when  raised 
by  a  higher  race  to  a  level  of  life  which  he  was  unable  of  him- 
self to  attain,  has  never  shown  any  ability  to  maintain  him- 
self there ;  he  lacks  the  brain  fibre,  the  brain  power,  which 
is  necessary  to  do  so,  and  left  to  himself  he  retrogrades, 
reverts.'  We  are  of  opinion  that  greater  nonsense  could  not 
have  been  uttered  than  these  statements  that  we  have  repro- 
duced. What  autliority  has  either  Mr.  Cone  or  Mr. 
Clowes  for  speaking  on  the  condition  of  the  Haytians  and 
Jamaicans  ?  Has  either  Cone  or  Clowes  lived  in  Hayti  or 
Jamaica,  or  do  they  study  the  Haytians  and  Jamaicans? 
The  fact  that  Frenchmen  once  ruled  the  Haytians  and 
held  them  in  ignominous  bondage  does  not  prove  that  the 
French  belong  to  a  '  higher  race  '  than  our  Haytian  cousins. 
And  the  fact  that  the  British  rule  the  Jamaican  Africans, 
and  once  held  them  in  servile  thraldom,  does  not  prove  that 
the  British  belong  to  a  '  higher  race '  than  the  Africans  in 
Jamaica.  If  anyone  can  feel  himself  justified  in  saying 
these  things,  then  we  ask  him  this  :  Since  the  Romans 
ruled  the  Britons,  and  sold  them  as  slaves  in  the  markets 
of  Rome,  did  these  Romans  belong  to  a  '  higher  race '  than 
the  Britons  ?  And  since  the  Angles,  Jutes,  and  Sovereign 
tribes  of  Saxons  ruled  the  Britons,  did  these  former  belong 
to  a  '  higher  race  '  than  the  latter  ?  And  since  the  North- 
men and  Normans  ruled  the  Anglo-Saxons,  did  the  former 
belong  to  a  *  higher  race '  than  the  latter  ?  And  since  the 
German  Franks  subdued  the  Gauls,  did  the  former  belong 


6o  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

to  a  '  higher  race '  than  the  latter  ?  And  since  the  Visi- 
goths, or  West  Goths,  subdued  and  ruled  the  Iberians,  did 
the  former  on  that  account  belong  to  a  '  higher  race  '  than 
the  latter?  And  since  the  Moors  {i.e.  the  descendants  of 
Asiatics  and  Africans)  subjugated  and  ruled  Spain  for 
several  centuries,  did  the  former  belong  to  a  '  higher  race ' 
than  the  Spaniards?  And  since  the  Moors  subdued  the 
Lusitanians  and  ruled  them,  did  the  former  on  that 
account  belong  to  a  'higher  race'  than  the  latter?  And 
since  the  Visigoths  ruled  Portugal,  did  the  former  on  that 
account  belong  to  a  '  higher  race '  than  the  Lusitanians  ? 

No  man  is  justified  in  saying  that  the  white  man  belongs 
to  a  '  higher  race '  than  the  black  because  accident  or 
fortune  makes  him  the  temporary  ruler  of  the  latter.  The 
Jamaican  African  has  made  wonderful  progress  in  the  arts 
of  civiHzation  since  Emancipation,  all  things  being  duly 
considered.  We  have  to  bear  in  mind  that  a  master,  during 
the  period  of  slavery,  was  forbidden  by  law,  by  custom  and 
by  public  opinion,  to  educate  his  slave.  And  we  should  also 
remember  that  the  sun  of  two-thirds  of  a  century  of  freedom 
has  not  yet  set  over  the  heads  of  the  Jamaican  Africans. 

But  Sir  Henry  Arthur  Blake,  the  British  Governor  of 
Jamaica,  shall  deal  with  this  question,  and  tell  us  whether 
the  Jamaican  African  'has  never  shown  any  ability  to 
maintain  himself  in  a  high  level  of  life,  and  whether  the 
lacks  the  brain-fibre,  the  brain-power. 

The  Jamaican  Governor  surely  ought  to  know  the 
character  of  the  people  over  whom  he  is  sent  to  rule.  And 
we  undoubtedly  prefer  to  accept  his  opinion  of  the  Jamaican 
Africans  rather  than  that  of  Mr.  Cone  or  that  of  Mr.  Clowes. 
Writing  in  the  North  American  Review  for  February,  1891, 
on  the  condition  and  characteristics  of  the  Jamaican 
Africans,  amongst  other  interesting  facts  he  says  :  '  A 
thoughtless   estimate   of  these   people  (/.^.,  the  Jamaican 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.         6i 

Africans)  has  been  generally  accepted.  It  may  be  summed 
up  in  the  statement  that  they  are  densely  ignorant,  un- 
speakably lazy,  and  incapable  of  improvement.  My  expe- 
rience for  the  past  twelve  months  has  shown  me  that  this 
estimate  is  not  true.  During  that  time  I  have  visited  every 
portion  of  Jamaica,  and  spoken  to  large  numbers  of  the 
people.  I  have  met  the  peasant  proprietors  in  the  moun- 
tain valleys,  where,  with  the  exception  of  the  clergyman 
and  the  doctor,  the  face  of  a  white  man  is  not  often  seen. 
I  have  met  them  in  the  lowland  plains  of  the  seaboard,  and 
I  am  bound  to  say  that  I  have  met  among  them  men  equal 
in  intelligence,  shrewdness,  and  dignity  of  mind  to  men  of 
their  class  in  the  United  Kingdom.  Nor  is  the  estimate 
of  laziness  a  true  one.  Both  men  and  women  work  with 
the  full  average  of  diligence. 

'  The  people  who  in  times  gone  by  had  worked  as  slaves 
on  the  estates  were  gradually  extending  into  the  higher 
grounds  of  the  interior,  acquiring  property,  reclaiming  and 
planting,  with  all  the  diligence  that  is  the  offspring  of  owner- 
ship.' To  add  words  to  what  Sir  Henry  Blake  has  thus  stated 
is  unnecessary.     We  therefore  pass  on  to  the  Haytians. 

The  Haytians  were  not  taught  by  the  French,  for  igno- 
rance was  imposed  by  French  law  upon  the  slave;  and 
every  master  was  forbidden  by  law,  custom,  and  public 
opinion  to  educate  his  slave.  The  Haytians  received  their 
lessons  in  the  arts  of  government  from  Toussaint  the  Great, 
who  was  their  king  in  everything — and  in  every  way  but 
in  name  he  was  what  is  called  an  '  uncrowned  king.' 
Toussaint  the  Great  was  a  born  Governor  as  he  was  a  born 
Commander;  his  genius  and  governing  qualities  were  in- 
nate :  he  taught  his  able  lieutenants,  Dessalines  and 
Christophe,  and  others,  how  to  govern,  and  encouraged 
literature  and  the  fine  arts.  When  Toussaint  the  Great, 
thanks   to   the   perfidious    French,    disappeared   from    his 


62  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Fatherland,  Dessalines,  and  then   Christophe,  followed  in 
the  wake  of  the  Liberator  of  San  Domingo. 

It  cannot  be  correctly  said  that  the  Haytian,  because  he 
has  been  left  to  himself,  has  '  retrograded  '  or  '  reverted,'  as 
we  shall  endeavour  to  show.  We  are  of  opinion  that,  if  a 
State  be  misgoverned,  it  necessarily  yields  a  decreasing 
revenue,  and  its  commerce  remains  stagnant,  if  it  does 
not  decline.  If  a  State  does  not  yield  a  reasonable 
yearly  income,  then  it  may  be  fairly  taken  for  granted  that 
the  Government  which  pilots  the  destinies  of  that  State  is 
an  incapable  one.  The  British  Empire  is  the  first  in  the 
world  to-day  because  its  great  wealth,  derived  from  its  com- 
merce and  exports,  is  unsurpassed.  The  richness  of  the 
British  Empire,  then,  is  a  sure  sign  that  it  is  well  governed. 
If  the  British  Empire  were  misgoverned,  where  would  its 
commerce  be  ?  But  the  reverse  is  the  case  with  it,  as  may 
be  seen  in  the  fact  that  its  commerce  is  the  first  in  the 
world,  and  more  capital  can  be  found  put  into  it  than  is  the 
case  in  any  other  Empire. 

As  the  commerce  of  the  British  Empire,  then,  testifies 
that  the  Empire  is  being  properly  governed,  and  is  pro- 
gressing, we  shall  argue  fairly  if  we  show  that  Hayti  is,  as 
evidenced  by  her  commerce,  also  being  properly  governed, 
and  shows  signs  of  progress.  But  that  Hayti's  progress  may 
be  seen  to  greater  advantage,  we  shall  compare  the  mone- 
tary value  of  her  commercial  transactions,  and  her  revenue, 
with  those  of  other  States  which  have  an  equal  or  a  larger 
population  than  that  of  Hayti.  Hayti,  with  a  population 
of  550,000  Africans,  had  in  1887-88  a  revenue,  customs 
o?ily,  of  the  value  of  ;^  1,34  2,604.  Its  imports  were 
returned  at  ;£964,382,  and  its  exports  were  valued  at 
^1,485,023.  The  Republic  of  Bolivia,  with  2,300,000 
inhabitants,  had  its  public  revenue  valued  at  ^753,285  in 
1887-88  ;  that  is,  an  amount  nearly  twice  less  than  that  of 
the  revenue  of  Hayti.     Hayti's  exports  and  imports  were 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  63 

greater  than  those  of  the  Transvaal  Republic,  which  con- 
tains 800,000  inhabitants.  The  Republic  of  Guatemala, 
with  1,427,116  inhabitants,  had  in  1889  a  revenue  valued 
at  ;£769,9i9,  with  ;£i, 113,842  as  total  exports,  and 
^^839,934  as  value  of  total  imports  for  1888;  that  is,  less 
than  the  revenue,  imports,  and  exports  of  the  Haytians. 

The  Republic  of  Costa  Rica  had  not  a  greater  revenue 
in  1889-90  than  ;^6i2,526,  that  is,  an  amount  more  than 
twice  less  than  that  of  the  Haytians,  while  her  total  imports 
in  1889-90,  amounting  to  ^900,915,  and  her  total  exports 
in  1889-90,  which  did  not  exceed  ;£995,o5i,  were  also  both 
less  than  the  proceeds  of  Hayti's  imports  and  exports. 
The  Republic  of  Honduras  in  1888-89  had  her  revenue 
valued  at  only  ;£43 1,000  ;  that  is,  more  than  three  times 
less  than  that  of  the  Haytian  Republic. 

The  Haytian  Republic's  revenue  exceeded  that  of  the 
Republic  of  Nicaragua,  which  had  but  ^£635, 690  in  1887-88 
as  public  revenue,  while  her  imports  in  1886-87  amounted  to 
^£"587, 146,  and  her  exports  were  valued  at  ;£^578,3i5  in 
1886-87,  but  they  were  considerably  less  than  those  of 
Hayti  in  the  corresponding  period.  San  Salvador,  with  a 
population  of  651,130,  that  is,  a  Republic  having  over 
100,000  inhabitants  more  than  the  Republic  of  Hayti  con- 
tains, had  her  exports  for  1889  valued  at  ^£"840,5 61,  and 
her  imports  at  £42^,^^$,  both  considerably  less  than  those 
of  Hayti,  while  the  public  revenue  yielded  but  ;^6o8,885  ; 
that  is,  more  than  twice  less  than  that  of  Hayti.  The 
Republic  of  Ecuador,  with  1,000,000  inhabitants,  received 
only  ;^6o7,i52  as  her  pubUc  revenue  for  1890.  The  im- 
ports and  exports  of  Madagascar,  which  is  under  a  French 
protectorate,  with  an  estimated  population  of  4,000,000, 
did  not  realize  more  than  ;£"i62,o7i  and  ;^  164,7 71  ^^" 
spectively  in  1888;  that  is,  they  were  considerably  less 
than  those  of  Hayti,  with  only  550,000  inhabitants.  The 
French  possessions  of  Annam  and  Tongking,  with  15,000,000 


64  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

inhabitants,  had  their  joint  revenue  estimated  at  only 
;;^692,4oo  in  1888,  while  the  imports  in  1889  were  valued 
at  ;£872,4oo  and  the  exports  at  ^6^4,400;  that  is 
to  say,  that  they  were  considerably  less  than  those  of 
the  Haytians.  Hayti's  revenue  exports  and  imports 
exceeded  and  exceed  those  of  French  Cochin-China, 
she  having  a  population  of  1,700,000,  while  they  also 
exceed  those  of  French  Cambodia,  with  1,500,000  people. 
Palestine,  under  Turkish  rule  and  pilotage,  with  620,000 
inhabitants,  had  her  imports  valued  at  ;^232,ooo,  and 
her  exports  at  ^^2  7 1,461,  in  1889,  the  Holy  Land  con 
sequently  being  left  far  behind  by  Hayti  in  the  race  of  pro- 
gress and  wealth  and  commerce.  Nepaul,  with  2,000,000 
Nepaulese,  follows  the  leadership  of  the  Haytians,  for  her 
revenue  did  not  amount  to  more  than  ;^i, 000,000  in  1885. 

The  Sultanate  of  Oman,  with  1,600,000  demoralized 
Asiatics,  had  her  imports  in  1889-90  valued  at  ;£"3o5,ooo 
only,  while  the  value  of  her  exports  did  not  reach  a  higher 
figure  than  3^243,000  ;  her  annual  revenue  not  exceeding 
;£"37,5oo,  the  Asiatic  thus  yielding  the  palm  in  business 
capabilities  to  the  Haytian. 

Under  native  rule,  Hayti  amasses  a  greater  revenue 
than  does  the  Colony  of  the  Straits  Settlements,  with  a 
population  of  over  600,000  under  the  British  rule. 

The  imports  and  exports  of  Tripoli,  under  the  Sultan  of 
Turkey,  with  a  population  of  1,010,000,  did  not  yield  more 
than  ;£'282,ioo  and  ;£323,ooo  respectively  in  1889. 

The  Asiatic  Kingdom  of  Corea,  with  10,518,937  inhabi- 
tants, who  own  allegiance  to  his  Corean  Majesty,  Li  Ying 
Kum,  did  not  export  more  than  ;£" 2 17, 149,  and  imported 
only  ^597,005  worth  of  goods  in  1888."^' 

Europeans  have  been  four  centuries  in  the  Gold  Coast, 

*  For  confirmation  of  these  statistics,  if  necessary, '  Whitaker's 
Almanac'  for  1891  should  be  consulted. 


iRii 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN  65 


r  centuries  in  the  Gambia,  one  century  in  Sierra  Leone, 
and  more  than  half  a  century  in  Lagos,  yet  Gold  Coast, 
Lagos,  Sierra  Leone,  and  Gambia,  with  a  grand  total  of 
1,616,000  inhabitants,  under  British  rule,  altogether  yield 
less  revenue  and  exports  than  Hayti  does  under  native 
rule ;  and  the  imports  of  Hayti  also  exceed  those  of 
the  Gold  Coast,  Lagos,  and  Gambia  put  together.  The 
amount  of  Hayti's  yearly  imports  and  revenue  is  far  in 
excess  of  the  amount  of  the  revenue,  exports,  and  imports 
realized  by  Montenegro,  Luxemburg,  Monaco,  Liechten- 
stein, San  Marino,  and  Andorra  together.  Hayti's  exports, 
revenue  and  imports  are  not  far  behind  those  of  the  Vene- 
zuelan Republic  in  extent,  while  they  are  nearly  equal  to 
those  of  the  Kingdom  of  Servia. 

Haytian  imports  and  exports  for  the  year  1889  were 
returned  at  ^1,250,000  and  ;^2, 500,000,  and  those  for 
1890  amounted  to  ^4,062,500  and  ^^3, 125,000  respectively, 
while  the  customs-revenue  received  during  the  year  (1890) 
amounted  to  ;£"  1,791,666.* 

Hayti,  then,  has  undoubtedly  made  great  progress,  as  her 
exports,  revenue,  and  imports — the  two  former  more  so — 
greatly  exceed  those  of  twenty  different  States  with  about 
an  equal  number,  or,  to  speak  more  correctly,  with  a  greater 
number,  of  inhabitants  than  Hayti  has,  some  of  these  States 
being  under  the  government  of  men  who  glory  and  rejoice 
in  the  fact  that  they  are  of  European  descent.  Hayti  has 
not  retrograded  nor  reverted.  When  the  Haytian  people 
were  beginning  to  undertake  the  government  of  their  State, 
they  had  to  engage  to  pay  over  to  the  French  the  hand- 
some sum  of  90,000,000  francs  by  way  of  compensation  for 

*  See  page  5,  Annex  A,  and  page  i.  No.  902,  of  the  Report  for 
the  year  1890  on  the  Trade  and  Commerce  of  Hayti,  by  Acting 
British  Consul-General  Arthur  Tweedy  to  the  Marquis  of  Salis- 
bury, May,  1 89 1. 

5 


66  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  losses  supposed  to  have  been  incurred  by  the  French 
colonists  during  the  great  Haytian  struggles  for  Indepen- 
dence ;  and  this,  of  course,  had  the  effect  of  crippling  the 
progress  of  Hayti.  But,  nothing  daunted,  Hayti  emerged 
from  her  fetters  in  a  few  years,  and  is  now  free,  and 
occupies  no  mean  place  in  the  ranks  of  civilized  and 
independent  nations  in  the  way  of  wealth  and  general 
progress. 

There  are  Faculties  of  Law  and  Medicine,  Colleges,  a 
Military  Academy,  600  Schools,*  and  what  not  in  Hayti. 
Of  the  long  line  of  poets  and  historians  Toussaint-L'Ouver- 
ture  le  Grand  and  J.  Jacques  Dessalines's  Fatherland  boasts, 
the  following  are  a  few :  Demesvor  Delorme,  Fenelon 
Duplesis,  Paul  Lochard,  Alfred  Williams,  Ducas-Hippolyte, 
Tertulian  Guilband,  Battier,  Emmanuel  Edouard,  Jules 
Auguste,  Arthur  Bowler,  Thomas  Madion,  B.  Ardouin, 
Saint-Remy,  J.  J.  Chaney,  Thales  Manigat,  Emile  Deslandes, 
Chenet/(?r^,  Oswald  Durand,  Arnold  Laroche,  while  Joseph 
Arelim,  Louis  Joseph  Jauvier,  Cauvin  pere,  Frangois  and 
Guillaume  Manigat,  A.  Firmin,  Dalbewar  Jean  Joseph, 
Nemours  Pierre  Louis,  Apollon,  Stewart,  Montasse,  Saladin 
Lamour,  Nelson  Desroches,  Leger  and  Luxembourg  Cauvin, 
Jacques  Nicolas  Leyer,  E.  and  A.  Desert,  and  others,  too 
numerous  to  mention,  distinguished  in  the  arts  and  sciences, 
literature  and  social  matters,  are  the  pride  of  Hayti 
and  the  Ethiopian  race.  The  minerals  gold,  silver, 
tin,  iron,  copper,  with  timber,  are  found  in  abundance. 
The  Haytian  grows  sugar,  cocoa,  coffee,  cotton,  tobacco, 

■*  Free  or  Assisted  Education  has  existed  in  Hayti,  a] 
country  not  a  hundred  years  old,  from  the  year  i860,  during 
General  Geffrard's  residency  ;  and  yet  Britain,  a  country  as  old 
as  the  flood,  is  not  able  to  boast  oi  free  education^  in  the  strict 
sense  of  the  word.  Education  in  Liberia,  as  in  Hayti,  is  com- 
pulsory. I 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  67 

and  he  has  honey,  wax,  gums,  hides,  logwood,  and  maho- 
gany— all  testifying  that  Hayti  is  not  '  retrograding '  nor 
*  reverting.'  Manifestly,  then,  the  Haytian  is  not  childish, 
nor  inferior  to  the  Caucasian  in  any  way. 

Mr.  Laird  Clowes,  not  believing  what  he  has  said  on  the 
score  of  African  childishness,  perorates  with  the  following 
sentences,  '  And  everyone  who  knows  thoroughly  the  African, 
either  in  Africa  or  in  America,  can  have  no  other  estimate  of 
his  character.' 

We  say  that  the  Island  of  Jamaica  belongs  to  the  American 
Continent,  and  Sir  Henry  Arthur  Blake,  who  knows  the 
Jamaican  African  '  thoroughly,'  eulogizes  the  Africans,  as 
we  had  occasion  in  preceding  pages  to  show.  We  should 
like  it,  however,  to  be  understood  that  in  quoting  Sir  Henry 
Blake  we  quote  him  merely  as  a  private  individual,  for  we 
do  not  look  up  to  Sir  Henry  with  any  admiration  as  an 
administrator.  But  we  prefer  Sir  Henry  A.  Blake's  opinion 
of  the  Africans  to  those  of  Stanley,  Clowes,  Cone,  or  any 
other  of  their  following.  The  British  Governor  of  Jamaica, 
however,  does  not  stand  alone  in  his  praiseworthy  and 
appropriate  eulogy  of  the  Africans.  Mr.  Charles  Foster 
Smith,  of  Vanderbilt  University,  who,  unlike  Clowes,  lives 
in  America,  and  therefore  can  speak  with  unqualified 
authority  of  the  qualities  of  the  Africo-Americans,  con- 
tributes a  letter,  on  the  '  Negro  in  Nashville,' to  the  Ce?itury 
illustrated  monthly  magazine  for  May,  1891,  in  which  he 
says :  '  I  have  long  believed  that  of  all  places  in  the  South 
the  Negro  has  had  in  Nashville,  Tennessee,  the  fullest 
opportunity  to  show  what  he  could  make  of  himself,  has 
there  been  more  nearly  than  elsewhere  accorded  all  that  the 
law  accords  him.  For  some  time,  therefore,  I  have  watched 
pretty  closely  his  progress,  and  now  offer  some  of  the  results 
of  my  observation,  so  far  as  I  can,  without  advancing  any 
theory  or  pleading  any  cause. 

5—2 


68  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

'  It  has  doubtless  been  very  fortunate  for  the  Negroes  in 
Nashville  that  they  have  been  in  a  decided  minority,  so  that 
they  have  given  less  attention  to  politics  than  they  might 
otherwise  have  done.  Nashville  is  a  city  of  schools  and 
colleges  and  churches,  of  considerable  culture,  decided 
liberality  of  thought,  a  thriving  place  where  honest  men  can 
make  a  living  and  more,  where  the  people  like  to  own  their 
homes,  and  make  themselves  comfortable  in  them.  It  is  a 
good  place,  therefore,  for  the  Negro  to  learn  by  contact. 

'  The  city  superintendent  of  public  schools  says  that  the 
Negroes  show  even  more  eagerness  to  get  an  education  than 
the  whites,  and  he  claims  that  no  discrimination  is  made 
against  them  in  the  appointments  of  their  schools,  which 
are  now  taught  exclusively  by  Negro  teachers,  thirty-six  in 
number.     To  the  credit  of  these  teachers,  he  mentions  that, 
at  the  last  examination  for  teachers,  the  highest  marks  were 
made    by    two    Negro    applicants.     Besides    their    public 
schools,  there  are  three  Negro  colleges  in  Nashville — Fisk, 
Central  Tennessee,  and  Roger  Williams.     Two  decades  ago 
the  two  older  of  these  institutions  were  little  more  than 
primary  schools,  most  of  the  pupils  just  beginning  to  read, 
some  in  the  Fifth  Reader,  none  beyond  cube  root  in  arith- 
metic.    In  1888  the  college  department  of  Fisk  numbered 
42,  the  normal  46  ;  in  Central  Tennessee  college  16,  normal 
(in   classes  corresponding   to    Fisk)   about   61 ;  in    Roger 
Williams   college  7,  normal   (in    classes   corresponding   to 
those  at  Fisk)  21 ;  total  in  Fisk  (in  all  departments)  475,  in 
Central  Tennessee  541,  in  Roger  Williams  192.     All  these 
students  were,  perhaps,  as  far  advanced  as  were  the  furthest 
twenty  years   ago.     At  Central  Tennessee   there  are  also 
regular    departments    of    medicine,    dentistry,    and     law. 
Though  the  charge  is  just  that  the  Negro,  at  his  present 
stage,  needs  Latin,  Greek,  and  the  so-called  liberal  studies 
less  than  anything  else,  surely  42  A.B.  students  out  of  475 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN         69 

is  not  an  excessive  proportion.  The  ministry  and  other 
professions  need  already  a  larger  ratio.  The  greater  part  of 
the  remainder  are  simply  getting  the  plain  elements  that  are 
necessary  to  any  man's  or  woman's  well-being.  Besides, 
these  institutions  pay  considerable  attention  to  industrial 
training.  All  boarding  pupils  are  required  to  devote  an 
hour  a  day  to  such  forms  of  labour  as  may  be  required  of 
them,  and  the  cleanest  school-building  I  ever  saw  is  Living- 
stone Hall,  of  Fisk  University,  which  is  kept  clean  by  the 
pupils.  A  certain  number  of  young  men  at  Fisk  learn  print- 
ing every  year,  and  others  will  henceforth  learn  carpentry 
and  other  useful  handicrafts ;  while  the  young  women  are 
taught  nursing  the  sick,  and  the  rules  of  hygiene,  cooking, 
dressmaking,  and  plain  sewing.  The  course  of  industrial 
training  in  Central  Tennessee  College  and  "Roger  Williams 
University  is  about  the  same. 

'  The  catalogue  of  Fisk  University  informs  us  where  its 
graduates  are,  and  what  they  are  doing.  Of  62  college 
graduates,  38  (or  61  per  cent.)  are  teachers ;  18  (or  13  per 
cent.)  are  preachers  ;  of  48  normal  graduates,  32  (or  66  per 
cent.)  are  teachers ;  eight  of  the  remainder  are  wives,  leaving 
only  eight  (or  17  per  cent.)  for  other  occupations.  Doubt- 
less the  great  majority  of  all  that  study  in  any  department 
become  teachers  at  present.  Does  this  education  lift  up 
the  Negroes  as  it  usually  does  the  rest  of  humanity  ?  I  visited 
lately,  with  the  city  superintendent,  a  Negro  school,  the 
average  attendance  of  which  is  nearly  eight  hundred,  in 
"  Black  Bottom,"  the  very  heart  of  the  worst  quarter  of  the 
city,  and  I  saw  there  hundreds  of  Negro  children — very 
many  of  whom  came  from  environments  hostile  to  all  that 
is  good  and  elevating — with  clean  faces,  for  the  most  part 
neatly  dressed,  orderly  in  behaviour,  studious  and  attentive 
— in  conduct  equal  to  any  school  I  ever  saw.  A  college 
president,  who  has  an  exceedingly  frank  way  of  talking  of 


70  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  dark  as  well  as  the  bright  side  of  the  situation,  says  that 
of  more  than  four  thousand  pupils  in  twenty  years  he  has 
never  heard  of  one  in  the  penitentiary  ;  and  there  had  never 
been,  so  far  as  known,  a  case  of  unchastity  among  the  pupils 
boarding  at  the  college.  Other  evidences  will  be  given 
indirectly  below. 

'  Just  here  I  wish  to  say  that  Nashville  has  been  blessed  in 
the  character  of  the  Northern  men  and  women  who  have 
come  to  teach  in  these  Negro  colleges.  They  have  come 
in  the  truest  missionary  spirit ;  have  patiently  submitted  to 
a  kind  of  social  ostracism ;  have  endeavoured  to  cultivate 
m  the  Negro  only  such  qualities  as  make  for  peace,  patience, 
honesty,  and  good  citizenship.  They  have  "  respect  unto 
the  recompense  of  the  reward,"  but  do  not  expect  it  here. 
They  possess  their  souls  in  patience.  The  good  men  and 
women  estimate  their  own  trials  and  sacrifices  as  less  than 
those  of  foreign  missionaries,  while  those  of  their  (white) 
Southern  neighbours  who  appreciate  them  know  how  much 
easier  it  is  to  go  to  China  and  Japan  and  Africa,  and  be 
considered  heroes  and  heroines,  than  to  do  this  home- 
mission  work.  They  are  the  best  friends  of  the  Southern 
whites,  as  well  as  of  the  Southern  Negroes,  but  only  the 
next  generation  of  us  will  fully  know  it. 

*  But  the  country  knows  more  about  the  Negro's  educa- 
tion than  about  his  efforts  in  business  and  how  he  lives  at 
home.  I  have  visited  the  places  of  business  of  a  large 
number ;  e.g.^  a  tailor's  shop  where  from  five  to  eight  hands 
are  employed  ;  a  shoe  shop  employing  from  eight  to  fifteen 
men,  two  of  them  white  ;  a  poultry  and  egg  store,  having 
two  branch  houses  in  other  towns,  and  a  trade  extending 
into  several  States,  the  business  amounting  to  100,000  dozen 
eggs  per  month,  and  a  shipment  of  five  car-loads  of  poultry 
per  week,  requiring  seven  clerks,  two  of  them  white  book- 
keepers ;  a  feed  store  with  a  business  worth  over  $1,000  per 


I 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.         yi 


month  ;  three  furniture  stores,  new  and  secondhand  ;  a  coal 

|,nd  wood  yard  requiring  four  waggons ;  two  undertakers' 
hops ;  the  offices  of  three  doctors,  one  of  whom  requires 
wo  horses,  and  though  two-thirds  of  his  practice  is  charity, 
idllected  last  year  $2,600,  another  a  graduate  of  the  Harvard 
Sledical  School,  and  already  after  three  months  making  a 
living ;  grocery  stores  and  butchers'  shops  ;  a  livery  stable ; 
several  offices  of  lawyers  and  real-estate  dealers,  to  say 
nothing  of  hack-drivers,  owning  from  one  to  several  car- 
riages ;  barbers,  and  the  like.  I  have  heard  white  business 
men  commend  the  character  of  some  of  them  in  a  manner 
of  which  any  man  might  be  proud.  The  trade  of  most  of 
them  is  mainly,  or  very  largely,  with  the  whites.  They  are 
only  a  few  of  the  most  thriving  of  the  well-to-do  Negroes  of 
Nashville ;  but  of  course  the  great  majority  are  still  only 
day  labourers.  A  number  of  Negroes  told  me  with  pardon- 
able pride  of  their  investments  in  real  estate.  One  had 
made  his  first  purchase  with  money  saved  while  in  a  Govern- 
ment clerkship,  and  now  his  income  from  city  property  is 
$100  per  month.  Most  buy,  I  am  told,  with  the  view  to 
building  a  home.  The  Negroes  realize  already  that  nothing 
so  elevates  them  in  the  eyes  of  the  world  as  property,  and 
the  "  business  "  fever  among  the  young  is  so  strong  that  one 
of  the  colleges  has  found  it  necessary  to  have  sermons 
preached  against  excessive  eagerness  to  make  money. 

'  The  Negroes  of  Nashville  have  also  made  a  promising 
beginning  in  the  way  of  combining  for  church  or  benevolent 
enterprises. 

'  The  only  Negro-church  publishing  house  in  the  world  is 
located  here,  the  building,  five  stories  high,  being  situated 
on  the  public  square.  It  was  purchased  with  the  contribu- 
tions of  the  children  of  the  African  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church.  A  home  for  aged  and  indigent  Negroes  is  the 
latest   enterprise,   while   a   shop   for   teaching   mechanical 


72  THE  LONE  STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

trades  was  opened  a  year  or  so  ago.  The  number  of 
benevolent  church  societies  is,  of  course,  legion. 

'  More  interesting  still  were  the  discoveries  I  made  in  the 
homes  of  the  Negroes.  Through  the  courtesy  of  a  well- 
educated  Negro  who  works  ardently  for  the  welfare  of  his 
race,  I  had  the  opportunity,  in  company  with  a  friend,  to 
inspect  in  one  day  more  than  twenty  of  the  better  class  of 
homes.  The  list  of  representative  homes  we  were  to  see 
included  more  than  fifty  ;  but  the  time  was  too  short.  Most 
were  taken  by  surprise,  but  willingly  showed  their  houses 
from  cellar  to  garret.  The  result  may  be  summed  up  as 
follows  :  The  occupant  was  the  owner  in  every  case  but  one. 
In  most  parlours  there  were  pianos,  and  handsome  carpets 
on  the  floor,  with  other  furniture  to  match ;  indeed,  the 
houses  were  generally  carpeted  throughout,  while  bedrooms, 
dining-rooms  and  kitchens  were  remarkably  clean.  I  noted 
with  pleasure  several  bath-rooms,  and  remarked  how  one 
thrifty  pair  had  so  arranged  their  handsome  base-burner 
stove  that  it  heated  comfortably  the  whole  house  of  four  or 
five  rooms  at  a  cost  of  only  a  few  cents  a  day.  It  was 
interesting  to  learn  that  in  most  cases  where  the  heads  of 
families  were  young,  they  had  been  educated  at  one  of  the 
Negro  colleges  in  the  city  ;  where  old,  that  the  children  had 

attended  these.     Let  one  example  stand  for  all.     A is 

the  janitor  of  one  of  the  banks  of  the  city.  By  working 
hard  at  the  bank,  while  his  wife  worked  and  saved  at  home, 
he  has  graduated  one  son  and  two  daughters  at  Fisk  Uni- 
versity, the  fourth  and  last  child  being  now  there.  His 
son,  at  first  a  teacher,  is  now  in  the  service  of  the  Pullman 
Company ;  one  daughter  is  married,  the  other  is  a  teacher. 
His  house  is  comfortably  furnished,  and  his  lot  extends  one 
hundred  feet  in  a  very  respectable  street  in  the  heart  of  the 
city. 

'Just  two  or  three  remarks  at  the  close.  First,  I  am 
quite  sure  that  more  comfortable  and  well-kept  homes  could 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN.  73 

not  be  found  anywhere  among  the  same  number  of  whites 
of  the  same  income,  and  the  owners  of  these  homes  have 
the  same  interest  in  good  government,  peace,  good  morals, 
the  well-being  of  society,  as  the  better  class  of  whites  have. 
These  well-kept  homes  are  not  only  the  best  proof  of  the 
progress  in  civilization  of  the  Negro  race,  but  they  are  also 
the  best  security  for  the  welfare  of  the  whites  in  property 
and  in  morals  ;  and  I  have  never  had  so  much  hope  for  the 
future  of  this  region  as  since  I  learned  these  things.  Granted 
that  these  may  be  the  picked  few,  it  is  most  hopeful  that 
there  is  a  picked  few,  whose  example  will  inspire  others  to 
lift  themselves  up.  Finally,  an  interesting  fact  which  I  have 
not  found  place  for  elsewhere — one  of  the  daily  papers  of 
Nashville  reports  a  circulation  among  the  Negroes  of  more 
than  eighteen  hundred  copies.' 

Even  Mr.  James  Bryce,  M.P.  for  Aberdeen,  who  is  not 
by  any  means  the  African's  friend,  is  compelled  to  admit 
that  the  American  Africans  '  have  not  relapsed  into  sloth 
and  barbarism ;'  and  he  further  says :  '  The  proximity  of 
trading  and  manufacturing  towns  draws  a  number  of  the 
Africans  into  closer  relations  with  the  whites,  and  gives  an 
impulse  towards  progress  to  the  whole  mass.'* 

With  all  these  testimonies  before  us,  dispelling  the  theory 
that  the  African  is  inferior  to  the  Caucasian,  and  is  *  childish,' 
the  statement  as  made  by  Laird  Clowes,  that  '  Everyone 
who  knows  thoroughly  the  African  Negro,  either  in  Africa 
or  in  America,  can  have  no  other  estimate  of  his  character ;' 
that  is,  that  he  is  childish,  and  therefore  inferior  to  the 
Caucasian,  is  but  a  sorry  joke,  if  it  may  not  be  more  strongly 
characterized. 

Mr.  Bryce's  testimony  as  to  the  Africans  speaks  volumes 
for  our  people,  inasmuch  as  the  Honourable  Member  for 
ifcA-berdeen  is  in  the  ranks  of  the  opposition  to  the  Africans. 

I^K^  Bryce's   'American  Commonwealth,'  Vol.   III.,  Part  VI., 
I^Hap.  cxvi.,  p.  671. 


74  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

We  do  not  know  whether  we  have  said  enough  in  dis- 
proof of  the  saying,  that  the  intellectual  capacity  of  the 
African  is  of  an  inferior  order  to  that  of  the  Caucasian,  and 
we  are  not  sure,  therefore,  whether  we  ought  to  carry  on 
the  discussion  a  little  further.  We  have  cited  the  testi- 
monies of  men,  white  men,  competent  to  judge  of  the  rela- 
tive position  of  the  black  and  the  white  man  on  the  score 
of  intellectuality.  We  have  done  more.  We  have  men- 
tioned by  name  many  distinguished  Africans.  But  how 
many  eminent  men  there  have  been  of  our  people  whose 
names  we,  unfortunately,  do  not  even  know,  because  they 
have  been  '  unhonoured  and  unsung '  in  public  print ! 

We  are,  however,  greatly  indebted  to  Liberian  Blyden 
for  telling  us,  in  his  '  Christianity,  Islam,  and  the  Negro 
Race,'  p.  46,  on  the  authority  of  Ticknor,  who  wrote  on 
p.  582,  in  his  '  History  of  Spanish  Literature,'  that  an 
African,  the  '  el  Negro  Juan  Latino '  of  Cervantes,  who  was 
born  in  Africa,  and  early  in  his  youth  transferred  to  Spain, 
rose  by  his  learning  to  be  Professor  of  Latin  and  Greek  in 
the  school  attached  to  the  Catholic  Cathedral  of  Granada, 
and  was  the  distinguished  author  of  a  Latin  poem  in  two 
books,  in  the  sixteenth  century. 

Liberian  Blyden  also  tells  us  that  Henry  Diaz,  the  distin- 
guished and  celebrated  Brazilian  African  General,  is  held  in 
the  highest  estimation  by  Brazilian  Historians. 

It  is  not  only  the  Ancient  and  Pagan,  and  the  Modern 
and  Christian,  worlds  which  have  produced  African  opti- 
raates  in  camp,  cabinet,  and  church.  The  Modern  Mahom- 
medan  world  has  produced  just  as  many  (if  not  more  in 
point  of  numbers)  Africans  of  distinction.  But  there  is  a 
difference  between  the  Mahommedan  African  and  the 
Pagan  or  Christian  African. 

The  Mahommedan  African  differs  from  the  Christian 
and    the  Pagan    African    in    this    much,    that   whilst   the 


I 


UNCLE  REMUS  AND  THE  CAUCASIAN  75 


virtues  and  other  great  qualities  of  the  Mahommedan 
African  have  been  not  only  '  honoured  and  sung,'  but 
written  eulogies  have  been  handed  down  to  posterity,  those 
of  the  Christian  African  have  been  '  unhonoured  and  un- 
sung '  as  a  general  rule ;  while  those  of  the  Pagan  African, 
if  they  have  been  'honoured  and  sung,'  have  not  been 
handed  down,  as  a  general  rule,  in  written  eulogies  to 
posterity. 

For  the  same  eminent  man  and  brilliant  author,  Liberian 
Blyden,  teaches  us  that  '  it  is  well  known  that  numerous 
characters  have  arisen  in  Africa — Negro  Muslims — who 
have  exerted  no  little  influence  in  the  military,  political,  and 
ecclesiastical  affairs  of  Islam,  not  only  in  Africa  but  in  the 
lands  of  their  teachers.  In  the  biographies  of  Ibn  Khal- 
likan  are  frequent  notices  of  distinguished  African  Mahom- 
medans.  Koelle,  in  his  "  Polyglotta  Africana,"  gives  a 
graphic  account  of  the  proceedings  of  the  great  Fodie, 
whose  zeal,  enthusiasm,  and  bravery  spread  Islam  over  a 
large  portion  of  Nigritia.' 

He  (Dr.  Blyden)  makes  mention  of  the  celebrated 
Sheikh  Omaru  Al-Hajj,  a  native  of  Futah  Toro,  who  sub- 
jugated several  mighty  chiefs  of  powerful  Pagan  tribes 
lying  to  the  east  and  south-east  of  Futah  Toro.  One  of 
his  sons,  Ahmadu  by  name,  is  now,  says  Blyden,  King  of 
Sego  in  Bambarra,  while  another  rules  over  Hamd-Allahi, 
two  of  the  largest  cities  in  Central  Africa. 

'  Al-Hajj  Omaru,'  Liberian  Blyden  again  informs  us, 
'  wrote  many  Arabic  works  in  prose  and  poetry.  His  poems 
are  recited  and  sung  in  every  Mahommedan  town  and 
village,  from  Futlah-town,  in  Sierra  Leone,  to  Kano.  His 
memory  is  held  in  the  greatest  respect  by  all  native  students, 
and  they  attribute  to  him  many  extraordinary  deeds,  and 
see  in  his  successful  enterprises,  literary  and  military,  proofs 
of  divine  genius.' 


CHAPTER    III. 

IMMORALITY. 

In  this  chapter  we  propose  to  treat  of  '  Immorality.'  But 
if  there  is  a  subject  less  pleasant,  and  more  uninviting  to 
discuss,  it  surely  is  the  subject  of  Immorality.  The  un- 
pleasant duty  is  not  self-imposed,  nor  does  the  subject 
derive  its  origin  from  us ;  and  yet  we  cheerfully  and  un- 
hesitatingly take  up  the  task  which  has  been  forced  upon 
us  by  the  unrivalled  libellers  of  that  African  race  to  which 
we  have  the  honour  and  pleasure  to  belong. 

We  shall,  then,  deal  with  Immorality  as  it  exists  in  the 
world  to-day,  and  have  also  a  look  at  the  past,  and  see 
what  are  the  mischievous  effects  of  which  immorality  can 
be  traced  as  the  direct  or  indirect  cause. 

Immorality  prevails  everywhere — in  Asia  and  Australasia, 
as  well  as  among  the  Africans ;  and  it  is  just  as  rampant  in 
America  and  in  Europe.  We  must,  however,  in  the  first 
place,  look  at  Immorality  as  it  affects  the  African  Race. 

Those  who  are  responsible  for  whatever  immorality  there 
is  amongst  the  Africans  are  the  Europeans  and  Americans, 
all  those  Caucasians  who  engaged  in  the  infamous  traffic  of 
slavery  and  the  slave-trade,  and  who  owned  slaves.  We 
admit  that  Immorality  exists  amongst  the  Africans;  yet 
we  must  not  be  misunderstood  as  saying  that  it  exists  to  a 


IMMORALITY.         \  77 

greater  extent  than  among  Caucasians.  |  Immorality  was 
always  in  the  world,  and  always  will  be  while  men  are 
swayed  by  sensual  passions  ;  and  that  will;  probably  be  as 
long  as  there  are  men  upon  the  earth.  , 

But  to  return  to  immorality  as  it  affects  the  African. 
That  kind  of  Immorality  which  we  propose  to  deal  with, 
and  which  is  often  laid  at  the  African's  door  by  his  enemies, 
is  none  other,  though  it  may  not  be  thus  designated,  than 
'Lust.'  Of  other  kinds  of  immorality,  Africans  seldom 
stand  accused  before  the  reading  public.  That  kind  of 
immorality,  lust,  the  African  is  often  accused  of,  and  we 
shall  deal  with  it  under  the  general  term  '  Immorality,' 
leaving  out  the  word  *  lust'  altogether,  which,  however,  the 
reader  will  understand  as  meant,  whenever  the  word  '  im- 
morality' is  used.  We  take  that  step  because  Immorality  is, 
in  our  opinion,  a  less  repulsive  and  a  more  refined  term. 

The  responsibility,  then,  for  the  Immorality  which  may 
lurk  among  the  Africans  lies  at  the  door  of  those  who  once 
enslaved  them  and  put  them  into  a  degrading  thraldom. 

When  the  dissipated,  giddy,  and  licentious  young,  and 
their  seniors,  the  sensual  old  men,  with  the  flickering  fires 
of  wanton  senility,  owned  the  Africans  as  slaves,  full  swing 
was  given  to  their  passions,  and  the  female  Africans,  whom  the 
whites  had  in  their  power  as  bondswomen,  dare  not  raise  a 
word  of  protest  against  the  ill-usage  and  the  brutal  conduct 
of  their  masters  without  courting  severe  punishment  at  their 
hands.  Many  an  African  woman  was  ruined,  her  life 
blighted,  and  her  modesty  sapped  in  those  days.  The 
African  females  never  were  willing  victims ;  but  they  had 
to  submit  to  their  fate  and  their  shame.  That  was  the 
baneful  example  set  the  slaves  by  their  masters.  When 
the  masters  were  compelled  to  manumit  their  slaves,  and 
slavery  received  its  deathblow,  the  example  of  shame,  the 
pernicious  example  of  Immorality  set  them  by  their  late 


78  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

masters,  did  not  in  any  strength  survive  with  the  African 
freedmen.  There  were  a  few,  certainly,  who  allowed  them- 
selves to  be  influenced  by  the  example  set  them  by  those 
who  had  been  their  masters.  Yet  when  the  facts  are  care- 
fully considered  and  noted,  by  the  unbiased  mind,  that 
two-thirds  of  a  century  have  not  yet  elapsed  since  freedom 
was  given  to  the  African,  it  will  have  to  be  admitted  that 
the  African  has  contrived  to  raise  his  standard  of  morality 
to  a  much  higher  level  than  it  was  at  in  the  old  days  of 
slavery. 

Whatever  individual  cases  of  immorality  there  may  be 
amongst  the  Africans,  it  is  certain  that  the  standard  of 
African  immorality  will  compare  favourably  when  brought 
into  comparison  with  the  standard  of  Caucasian  immorality. 
Indeed,  we  assert  that,  with  the  Caucasian,  immorality 
is  the  rule  and  morality  is  the  exception. 

Mr.  Clowes  is  not  of  our  opinion,  however,  and  thinks  it 
is  the  other  way ;  and  he  quotes  the  Rev.  Dr.  Tucker,  an 
American  citizen,  who  thus  expresses  his  views  on  African 
immorality  :  '  In  all  the  country  districts  the  removal  of  the 
restraints  of  slavery,  such  as  they  were,  has  resulted  in  an 
open  abandonment  of  every  semblance  of  morality,  and  the 
loss  almost  of  the  idea  of  marriage.  Why,  in  one  county  of 
Mississippi,  there  were,  during  twelve  months,  300  mar- 
riage licences  taken  out  in  the  county  clerk's  office  for 
white  people.  According  to  the  proportion  of  population, 
there  should  have  been,  in  the  same  time,  1,200  or  more 
for  Negroes.  There  can  be  no  legal  marriage  of  any  sort 
in  Mississippi  without  a  licence.  There  were  actually 
taken  out  by  coloured  people  just  three !  .  .  .  Soon  after 
the  war  the  Legislature  passed  an  Act  legalizing  the  union 
of  all  who  were  then  living  together — marrying  them  whether 
they  wished  it  or  not ;  and  for  years  afterwards  the  courts 
were  crowded  with  applications  for  divorce  from  coloured 


I 


IMMORALITY.  79 

people,  which  mostly  had  to  be  granted,  since  there  was 
ample  cause  for  divorce  under  either  the  Divine  or  the 
statute  law.  I  know  of  whole  neighbourhoods,  including 
hundreds  of  Negro  families,  where  there  is  not  one  single 
legally  married  couple,  or  couple  not  married,  who  stay 
faithful  to  each  other  beyond  a  few  months,  or  a  few  years 
at  most — often  but  a  few  weeks.  And  if  out  of  every  five 
hundred  Negro  families  one  excepts  a  few  dozen  who  are 
legally  married,  this  statement  will  hold  true  for  millions  of 
coloured  people.  And  these  things  I  tell  you  to-night  are 
but  hints.  I  cannot,  I  dare  not,  tell  the  full  truth  before  a 
mixed  audience.' 

That  is  what  Dr.  Tucker  says.  Of  course  we  do  not 
accept  his  statement,  but  if  there  be  any  truth  in  it  there  is 
undoubtedly  much  exaggeration.  And  his  statement  would 
have  been  still  more  one-sided  and  exaggerated  if  he  had 
not  been  'before  a  mixed  audience.'  Let  us  take  it  for 
granted  that,  in  the  country  districts,  and  in  those  country 
districts  only,  as  Mr.  Tucker  tells  us  (whom  Laird  Clowes 
blindly  follows  in  an  unquestioning  and  unreasoning  manner), 
there  are  Africo-Americans  who  are  averse  to  marriage,  and 
prefer  leading  the  lives  of  single  blessedness,  and  yet  lead 
immoral  lives,  then  we  must  respect  their  reasons  for  avoid- 
ing marriage  ;  for  they  have  the  same  reasons  for  not  marry- 
ing, or  wishing  to  marry,  as  a  great  many  of  their  white 
American  countrymen,  their  European  and  other  Caucasian 
fellow-creatures.  The  Africo-American,  like  the  Caucasian, 
may  have  aged  feeble  and  infirm  relatives  to  provide  for ; 
he  may  have  some  young  brothers  or  sisters,  or  both,  in 
addition  to  the  authors  of  his  being  to  care  for ;  and  he  may 
be  earning  just  barely  enough  to  keep  his  body  and  soul 
together.  In  either  of  these  cases,  why  should  a  man  marry 
when  he  cannot  afford  to  keep  a  wife  ? 

Just  recently — it  was  only  in  the  latter  part  of  the  past 


Bo  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

year  (1890) — an  eminent  French  legislator  proposed,  in  the 
French  Chamber  of  Deputies,  that  a  tax,  a  heavy  tax,  should 
be  levied  on  all  Frenchmen — bachelors  of  a  certain  age — 
who  either  did  not  promptly  marry,  or  who  were  resolved 
to  remain  bachelors  ;  that  Bill  was  calculated  to  have  the 
effect  of  not  only  increasing  the  number  of  the  French 
population  and  adding  to  the  defenders  of  La  Grande 
Nation^  but  was  also  calculated  to  raise  the  French  standard 
of  morality,  which  is  at  a  low  ebb  ;  as  it  was  thought  that 
the  severity  of  the  bachelor-tax  would  drive  many  inveterate 
French  bachelors,  there  and  then,  into  the  arms  of  matri- 
mony.    The  Bill,  however,  fell  through. 

There  are  those,  again,  of  the  sexes  who,  though  not 
married,  yet  cohabit,  and  with  regard  to  these  a  few  words 
must  be  said.  A  woman  may  be  thought  good  enough,  in 
the  estimation  of  her  paramour,  to  live  in  concubinage  with 
him,  yet  a  Caucasian  may  not  think  her  sufficiently  deserv- 
ing to  be  his  recognised  wife.  This  remark,  as  it  holds  good 
for  the  white  man,  in  whatever  part  of  the  world  he  resides, 
must  also  hold  good  for  the  Africo-American.  If  there 
were  American  Africans  in  the  country  districts  who  detested 
marriage,  and  consequently  avoided  it  for  a  few  years  after 
the  Act  of  Emancipation  was  passed  in  the  glorious  and 
immortal  year  1863  (and  year  1838  for  the  British  Africans), 
they  were  few  who  disliked  and  avoided  marriage.  The 
great  majority  knew  better  ;  they  did  not  follow  the  example 
set  them  by  their  late  but  licentious  masters.  To-day  the 
Africo- American's  standard  of  morality  is  higher  than  it  was 
before  1863,  for  when  the  American  Africans  received 
emancipation  they  immediately  began  to  reorganize  their 
hitherto  demoralized  ranks,  which  had  been  shattered  in  the 
days  of  slavery,  and  unfurled  the  standard  of  virtue  and 
raised  their  moral  condition  to  its  present  high  level.  They 
buried  rampant  immorality  in  a  common  grave  with  slavery. 


IMMORALITY.  8i 

To  continue.  If  matrimony  before  1882  (for  Dr.  Tucker 
made  his  statements  before  the  Episcopal  Congress  sitting 
at  Richmond,  Virginia,  in  1882)  had  no  charms  for  those 
Africans  (and  these  were  very  few)  who,  although  they  lived, 
in  adulterous  concubinage,  avoided  marriage,  why,  as  we 
said  before,  they  had  their  reasons,  and  their  scruples  must 
be  respected,  just  as  are  those  of  Caucasians. 

The  Red  King,  the  second  Norman  William  of  England, 
lived  in  adulterous  concubinage  with  sundry  and  divers 
women,  but  he  would  not  have  married  one  of  them,  or  any 
other  woman,  for  a  consideration.  And  he  died  as  he  had 
lived,  an  unmarried  man.* 

But  we  are  told  that  when  the  Mississippi  Legisla- 
ture, immediately  on  the  conclusion  of  the  American  Civil 
War,  '  passed  an  Act  legalizing  the  union  of  all  who  were 
then  living  together,  marrying  them  whether  they  wished  it 
or  not,'  that  '  for  years  afterwards  the  courts  were  crowded 
with  applications  for  divorce  from  coloured  people,  which 
mostly  had  to  be  granted,  since  there  was  ample  cause  for 
divorce  under  either  the  Divine  or  the  statute  law.'  If  such 
a  state  of  things  did  exist  in  Mississippi,  in  or  before  1882, 
to  the  extent  depicted  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Tucker,  we  deeply 
deplore  it ;  but,  unfortunately  for  himself.  Dr.  Tucker  was 
only  too  prudent  not  to  attempt  to  substantiate  his  state- 
ments by  adducing  proofs,  since  the  fact  is  that  he  had 
none  to  bring  forward :  consequently  we  see  no  reason  at 
all  why  we  should  believe  his  word  in  the  absence  of  all 
satisfactory  proofs. 

Even  though  immorality  existed,  and  may  exist  to-day  in 
ever  so  small  an  extent,  among  the  American  Africans,  it  is 

■''■  Lingard's  'History  of  England,' vol.  ii.,  chap,  ii.,  pp.  136, 
137,  and  147,  second  edition;  'The  English  Cyclopaedia  of 
Biography,'  vol.  vi.,  p.  717 ;  Freeman's  '  History  of  the  Norman 
Conquest  of  England,'  vol.  v.,  chap,  xxiii.,  p.  72,  A.D.  1876. 

6 


82  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

a  matter  to  be  deplored ;  but  it  is  consoling  to  think  that 
there  are  those — and  they  are  the  large  majority — who  are 
not  immoral,  whose  commendable  example  will  serve  to 
influence  others  to  lift  themselves  up  from  the  mire  of 
immorality. 

In  every  country  and  in  every  city,  among  all  peoples  and 
in  every  community,  Immorality  must  yet  be  a  force  and  a 
power  as  long  as  men  are  liable  to  carnal  sin  in  this  world 
of  ours  ;  and  as  they  will  always  be  liable  to  this  sin,  im- 
morality must  perforce  be  found  everywhere  in  our  world. 

Let  us  take  the  British  peoples  by  way  of  illustration. 
They  are  as  immoral  as  other  peoples  are ;  they  are  as  im- 
moral now  as  their  ancestors  have  been  in  the  buried  past ; 
and  we  have  every  reason  to  believe  that  they  will  be  so  in 
the  future.  We  may  have  occasion,  later  on  in  this  chapter, 
to  refer  again  to  the  past  history  of  immorality  in  Britain, 
but  we  shall  for  the  present  confine  ourselves  to  dealing 
with  immorality  as  it  exists  to-day  in  England. 

We  say  that  immorality  prevails  in  England  to-day  even 
as  it  does  in  every  other  country;  and  as  the  outcome  of 
immorality  there  were,  up  to  the  year  1890,  according  to  the 
best-known  computation,  at  least  16,220  petitions  for  divorce 
filed  in  England  alone  (Ireland  and  Scotland  being  ex- 
cluded), reckoning  from  the  time  of  the  establishment  of 
the  Divorce  Court  in  1858. 

Of  those  filed  there  is  an  average  of  800  petitions 
annually,  to  say  the  least ;  and  it  may  not  be  inaccurate 
to  say  that  more  than  five-sixths  of  those  petitions  pre- 
sented at  the  Divorce  Court  are  granted,  and  their  decrees 
made  absolute.  It  can  be  safely  said  that  the  great  majority 
of  those  parties  who  figure  as  respondents  in  the  divorc 
causes  must  admit,  that  the  presence  of  their  names  on  the 
Divorce  Court  list  is  the  outcome  of  their  failing  to  remain 
faithful  to  their  petitioning  husbands  or  wives,  even  for  a 


IMMORALITY,  83 

few  weeks ;  and  it  may  not  be  out  of  place  to  mention  that 
there  must  be  many  married  parties  who,  though  they  have 
grievances  on  the  score  of  immorality  against  their  husbands 
or  their  wives  that  sorely  need  redressing,  yet  refrain  from 
publishing  them  to  the  world,  and  consequently  avoid  the 
Divorce  Court. 

Very  often— and  it  is  a  fact  well  known;  a  matter,  indeed, 
of  common  knowledge — as  many  as  five  co-respondents 
figure  in  one  divorce  case ;  while  it  is  a  deplorable  thing 
to  contemplate,  that  the  present  year's  (1891)  Divorce 
Statistics  bid  fair  to  throw  those  of  previous  years  into  the 
shade  completely. 

But  do  not  brothels  and  houses  of  ill-fame  fall  under  the 
heading  of  immorality — are  they  not  the  temples  of  im- 
morality ?  And  their  frequenters  and  worshippers  are,  as  a 
matter  of  course,  all  immoral  men  and  women  ;  such 
temples  of  ill-fame  are  to  be  met  with  in  Britain  as  in 
France.  And  we  venture  to  say  it  is  a  matter  of  common 
knowledge,  that  in  Paris  many  a  shrine  of  ill-fame  exists 
which  is  known  to  the  Minister  of  the  Interior  and  to 
the  Prefect  of  Police ;  but  these  establishments  are  in  no 
way  interfered  with.  To  be  brief,  French  immorality  is 
notorious.  We  presume,  then,  that  we  are  justified  when 
we  say  that,  if  immorality  exists  to  any  great  extent  in 
Britain  and  in  France  (and  it  unfortunately  does  exist  to  a 
very  great  extent  indeed  both  in  Britain  and  in  France), 
it  is  likely  to  exist  to  an  even  greater  extent  among  the 
white  American  people  of  the  United  States  of  America 
than  it  does  even  among  Britishers  and  Frenchmen. 

Britain  and  France  are  in  the  front  rank  of  nations,  and 
may  be  termed  the  pioneers  and  leaders  of  civilization  and 
Christianity.  If  immorality,  then,  exists  to  a  great  extent  in 
either  or  both  of  these  countries  (and  it  only  too  truly  exists 
to  an  enormous  extent  in  both  of  them),  we  do  not  see  why 

6—2 


64  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

we  should  hesitate  to  say  that  it  exists  to  a  greater  extent 
among  the  white  Americans  of  the  United  States,  seeing 
that  American  liberty  is  greater  than  the  liberty  which  a 
Britisher  or  a  Frenchman  enjoys.  White  American  liberty 
is  unenvied  by  all  good  people,  because  it  almost  always  is 
synonymous  with  license — with  unbridled  license.  What  a 
white  American  citizen  dares  do  in  his  own  country  would 
not  for  a  moment  be  tolerated  in  Britain  or  in  France. 
The  Britisher  or  the  Frenchman  would  not  even  give  it  a 
thought ;  he  would  certainly  shrink  from  doing  it.  Do  we 
ever  hear  of  lynchings  in  Britain  and  France  as  we  con- 
stantly do  of  lynchings  in  the  United  States  of  North 
America  ?  Do  we  hear  of  British  New  Orleans  lynching- 
tragedies  ?  Do  we  hear  of  French  New  Orleans  lynching- 
tragedies?  Do  we  hear  of  British  or  French  mobs  over- 
powering sheriffs'  guards,  taking  hold  of  the  Africans  they 
are  conveying  to  gaol  and  lynching  them  ?  Or  do  we  hear 
of  British  or  French  breaking  into  the  gaols  of  North 
Carolina,  Virginia,  or  Florida,  in  bloodthirsty  quest  of 
Africans  or  other  unfortunate  victims,  that  they  may  lynch 
them  ?  We  say,  then,  that  white  American  liberty  is  greater 
than  that  enjoyed  by  either  the  Britisher  or  the  Frenchman  ; 
and  that  American  liberty  is  virtually  Hcense.  Those  who 
read  the  daily  papers,  especially  the  American  papers,  the 
New  York  Herald,  the  New  York  World,  and  the  New  York 
Police  Gazette,  will  certainly  bear  us  out  in  our  assertions, 
and  agree  with  us  that  American  liberty  is  virtually  license. 
Then,  in  a  country  where  there  is  the  greatest  license,  we 
may  expect  to  find  the  greatest  immorality.  And  we  may 
say  that  gross  immorality  is  the  offspring  of  gross  license. 
These  are,  then,  our  reasons  for  saying  and  believing  that 
greater  immorality  exists  among  the  white  American  people 
than  among  Britishers  and  Frenchmen. 

That  unbounded  license  which  the  white  American  has, 


IMMORALITY.  85 

his  black  countryman,  the  American  African,  does  not 
share.  Yet  we  must  mention  by  the  way  that  the  American 
Repubhc  contains  more  inhabitants  within  its  territory  than 
either  the  French  RepubHc  or  the  United  Kingdom.  And 
the  fact  must  be  borne  in  mind,  that  immoraUty  will  very 
often,  we  do  not  say  always,  be  more  rife  and  prolific  in  a 
country  which  contains  a  very  large  number  of  people  than 
it  will  be  in  a  country  which  contains  a  very  small  number 
of  inhabitants. 

We  now  return  to  Laird  Clowes,  who,  commenting  on 
the  statement  made  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Tucker,  writes  on 
page  III  of  'Black  America'  in  this  wise:  'These  words 
were  originally  spoken  before  the  Episcopal  Congress  at 
Richmond,  Virginia,  in  1882  ;  they  were  subsequently  pub- 
lished in  a  pamphlet,  and  I  am  generally  assured,  and  im- 
plicitly believe,  that  they  were  true  then  and  are  true  now.' 
And  Laird  Clowes  proceeds  to  add  that,  '  Even  the  Negroes 
themselves  dare  not  deny  them.  One  Negro  preacher 
pubhshed  a  pamphlet  in  which  he  admitted  that  ''This 
speech  reveals  humiliating  facts,  so  truthful  yet  so  hard  to 
acknowledge.  Not  one  of  our  social  circles,  if  we  can  be 
said  to  have  any,  is  clean  morally.  They  are  full  of  base, 
downright  hypocrisy  and  falsehood,  and  fully  two-thirds  of 
the  whole  are  members  of  the  churches.  Moral  character 
is  not  the  standard.  Crimes  that  should  cause  a  blush  on 
fair  cheeks  assume  a  front  of  brass,  and  defy  you  to  speak 
of  or  talk  about  them.  ...  A  coloured  man  only  a  few 
days  ago  contended  with  me  that  the  Negroes  were  right 
in  certain  of  their  practices,  because  the  Lord  Jesus  Him- 
self said  that  "Seven  women  should  lay  hold  of  one 
man." '  '  Such  was  the  confession,'  proceeds  the  Times^ 
Commissioner,  'of  the  Rev.  Isaac  WiUiams,  with  whom 
four  other  Negro  preachers  fully  concurred,  adding,  "  Our 
acquaintance  extends  over  seven  to  ten  thousand  coloured 


86  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

people,  concerning  whose  lives  we  know  the  truth,  and 
that  truth  is  set  forth  in  Dr.  Tucker's  speech  without  exag- 
geration. There  are  exceptions;  but  the  general  truth  is 
stated  exactly  as  it  is.  We  agree,  also,  that  he  has  only 
given  hints  as  regards  many  things  of  such  a  nature  that 
only  hints  are  possible."  ' 

Mr.  Laird  Clowes  tells  us  that  he  'implicitly  believes' 
that  the  Rev.  Dr.  Tucker's  words  'were  true  then,  and 
are  true  now,'  but  what  unfavourable  report  respecting  the 
African  will  Mr.  Clowes  not  believe  in?  Fortunately  for 
us  Africans,  Laird  Clowes'  belief  is  of  no  moving  force, 
and  in  no  way  affects  us,  and  we  can  afford  to  ignore  him 
and  his  belief  But  does  not  the  Commissioner  of  the 
Times  candidly  tell  us,  on  page  91  in  '  Black  America,'  to 
which  reference  should  be  made  by  the  reader,  that  the 
author  of  '  The  Silent  South ' — which  has  the  praiseworthy 
*  desire  to  do  all  that  lies  in  the  writer's  power  to  abate  the 
prevalent  race  friction ' — has  '  unwise  love  for  the  Negro  '  ? 
When  a  man  like  Mr.  Clowes  takes  Mr.  George  W.  Cable 
to  task  for  having  what  he  (Mr.  Clowes)  calls  '  unwise  love 
for  the  Negro,'  what  statement  prejudicial  to  the  African  is 
he  not  capable  of  '  implicitly  believing '  ?  Because  Mr. 
George  W.  Cable  has  '  a  desire  to  do  all  that  lies  in  his 
power  to  abate  the  prevalent  race  friction  '  in  the  Sunny 
South,  that  commendable  'desire'  is  dubbed  'unwise'  love 
for  the  African  by  Mr.  Laird  Clowes.  Would  Mr.  Clowes 
like  to  see  the  '  prevalent  race  friction '  continue  as  long  as 
possible  ?  We  are  sure  that  it  is  no  fault  of  Mr.  Cable's  if 
he  happens  to  think  differently  from  Mr.  Clowes,  and  enter- 
tains brotherly  affection  for  the  African. 

Mr.  Cable  is  an  honourable  man,  and  the  talented  author 
of  many  works,  mostly  novels  :  he,  like  a  true  Christian  and 
like  the  good  Mussulman  Abou  ben  Adhem,  is  a  philan- 
thropist and  'loves  his  fellow-men.' 


IMMORALITY.  87 

Mr.  Clowes  tells  us  that,  '  Even  the  Negroes  themselves 
dare  not  deny '  Mr.  Tucker's  statements  ;  but  we  ask  Mr. 
Clowes,  Who  are  those  Africans  who  '  dare  not  deny  them '? 
It  is  true  that  the  Rev.  Isaac  Williams,  'with  whom  four 
other  Negro  preachers  fully  concurred,'  to  all  intents  and 
purposes,  prima  facie,  admitted  them ;  yet  it  is  also  true 
that  their  admission  carries  little  or  no  weight.  In  an  age 
when  oppression  and  tyranny  are  rife ;  in  an  age  when 
the  members  of  an  unhappy  people  are  looked  down  upon 
as  belonging  to  an  inferior  and  degrading  race ;  in  an  age 
when  a  subject-race  reckons  amongst  its  ranks  the  whimper- 
ing and  the  fawning,  there  will  not  be  wanting  those  who 
are  ashamed  of  their  fellow-men  ;  nay,  more,  there  will  be 
found  base  and  unmanly  dastards  who,  in  order  to  court 
the  smiles,  and  win  the  good  graces,  of  those  of  their  rulers 
who  spurn  them,  are  only  too  ready,  like  so  many  Judases, 
to  denounce  their  fellow-countrymen.  Such  things  have 
happened  in  the  days  of  old  ;  history  furnishes  us  with 
many  instances,  and  we  are  satisfied  that  they  are  happen- 
ing also  in  our  own  time.  They  have  happened  among  the 
pale-faced  Caucasians  in  times  immemorial,  why  may  not 
they  unfortunately  happen  to-day  amongst  the  subject  and 
dark-skinned  Africans  ?  When  the  Scottish  Presbyterians 
were  sore-constrained,  and  matters  fared  ill  with  them,  in 
the  days  when  the  second  Charles  was  King,  they  sent  one 
James  Sharp  as  their  ambassador,  with  full  powers  to  plead 
their  cause  before  the  third  Stuart ;  but  when  that  astute 
ambassador  perceived  that  the  Merry  Monarch  and  his 
ungodly  court  entertained  the  most  deeply-rooted  and  un- 
yielding aversion  towards  all  Presbyterians  and  their  creeds, 
Sharp — when  he  might  have  pleaded  the  cause  and  urged 
the  suit  of  his  hard-pressed  and  corner-driven  Scottish  com- 
patriots and  co-religionists,  who  implicitly  confided  in  him, 
and   made   him   their   commissioner — betrayed   them,    by 


68  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

neglecting  the  duty  involved  in  his  commission,  and, 
with  a  view  to  currying  favour,  and  as  a  stepping-stone 
to  power,  embraced  the  faith  of  the  Merry  Monarch 
and  his  depraved  court,  which  the  majority  of  the 
British  people  professed  —  and  that  faith  was  Episco- 
pacy. He  was  rewarded  for  his  breach  of  faith  with  the 
Archbishopric  of  St,  Andrews  ;  but  when,  early  in  1679,  ^^ 
closed  his  inglorious  career,  meeting  with  his  death  from 
the  knives  wielded  by  the  hands  of  indignant  assassins — 
leaving  his  character  as  one  of  the  basest  to  be  found  in 
Scottish  History  —  few  Scotsmen  pitied  him;  fewer  still 
lamented  him.  Irish  history  also  furnishes  too  many  in- 
stances of  Irishmen  betraying  their  fellow-compatriots. 
There  was  the  notable  instance  of  the  treachery  of  Esmonde 
of  Wexford  in  '98,  when  the  noble  Lord  Edward  Fitzgerald 
and  the  gallant  Robert  Emmett  were  bravely  battling  for 
independence.  There  was  the  notable  instance  of  the 
treachery  of  Keogh  and  Sadlier  in  1852. 

Even  supposing  that  the  Rev.  Isaac  Williams,  and  his 
confreres^  the  '  four  other  Negro  preachers,'  are  not  men  of 
the  stamp  of  Sharp,  Esmonde,  Keogh,  Sadlier,  and  others, 
we  are  quite  satisfied  that  they  in  no  way  represented,  or 
represent,  the^  voice  of  Virginian  people  of  the  Ethiopian 
race,  and  were  not — nor  are  they  now — entitled  to  speak  on 
this  matter  with  any  authority.  It  is  idle  to  suppose  that 
the  Rev.  Isaac  Williams  and  his  four  colleagues  knew 
900,000  Virginian  Africans  intimately  ! 

Some  humiliating  instances  might  be  found  of  hypocrisy, 
in  English  political  circles,  which  should  keep  us  from 
undue  surprise  at  what  we  suspect  is  the  time-serving  of 
this  Rev.  Isaac  Williams  and  the  four  negro  preachers  who 
repeat  after  him.  We  sometimes  see  men  who  have  been 
themselves  condemned  in  an  English  High  Court  of  Justice, 
and  who  have  spent  months  in  English  gaols,  active  in  their 


IMMORALITY.  89 

'op^sition  to  other  men  who  have  also  been  condemned 
for  immoralities,  and  may  have  as  good  a  cry  that  injustice 
has  also  been  done  them.  A  man  basing  his  claim  to 
purity  on  the  injustice  of  his  own  legal  condemnation,  and 
then  hounding  from  all  possible  return  to  political  life  a 
man  who  also  declares  the  injustice  of  his  own  legal  con- 
demnation, is  a  strange  revelation  of  the  possibilities  of 
human  nature.  And  it  may  also  be  added,  that  there  is 
now  undergoing  his  punishment  for  immorality  of  an 
unusually  disgraceful  kind,  a  man  who  bears  an  honoured 
English  name,  and  had  taken  a  prominent  part  in  the 
defence  of  the  very  class  which  he  was  privately  inveigling 
to  their  ruin.  The  Rev.  Isaac  Williams,  and  his  four 
countrymen  and  co-religionists,  may  or  may  not  be  hypo- 
crites and  Pharisaical.  If  they  are  not  pharisees,  then  we 
say  that  they  have  our  humble  but  warm  encomiums  for 
thus  manfully  speaking  in  reproof  of  the  conduct  of  some 
of  our  African  countrymen.  Yet  if  the  reproof  or  rebuke  was 
called  for,  the  open  confession — the  confession  in  a  pub- 
lished pamphlet — was  wholly  uncalled  for.  But  if  they  are 
pharisees  or  hypocrites,  then  we  say  that  they  are  offending 
sinners  of  the  deepest  dye,  preaching  with  their  tongues 
what  they  do  not  practise. 

The  Rev.  Isaac  Williams,  moreover,  tells  us  that  '  a 
coloured  man,  only  a  few  days  ago,  contended  with  me 
that  the  Negroes  were  right  in  certain  of  their  practices, 
because  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  Himself  said  that  "  Seven 
women  should  lay  hold  of  one  man."  '"^  Well,  the  African 
might  have  told  the  reverend  gentleman  the  statement 
which  he  reports;  but  Mr.  Williams  does  not  tell  us  whether 
that  man  was  fairly  educated  or  an  ignorant  person ;  we 

*  This  sentence  belongs  to  the  Book  of  Isaiah.  They  are 
not  the  words  of  Jesus. 


90  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

infer  that  he  was  an  uneducated  person,  and  that,  though 
blamable,  his  responsibility  was  less  than  a  fairly  educated 
man  would  have  to  bear.  At  any  rate,  if  that  man  did  say 
that  '  Seven  women  should  lay  hold  of  one  man/  we  are 
quite  satisfied  that  he  could  have  been  none  other  than  an 
immoral  man. 

We  have  satisfied  ourselves,  then,  that,  whether  the 
African  under  review  was  educated  or  an  illiterate,  he 
was  of  an  immoral  disposition.  Like  all  other  persons 
who  are  sincerely  interested  in  the  welfare  of  our  African 
race,  we  are  not  behindhand  in  offering  our  rebuke  to 
that  man  of  the  African  race  who.  may  think  as  that 
African  appears  to  do.  Yet  we  do  not  hesitate  to  say 
that  the  reference  made  to  this  African  in  his  pamphlet, 
by  the  Rev.  Isaac  Williams,  which  furnishes  a  weapon 
with  which  our  enemies  may  strike  at  us  Africans, 
was  entirely  uncalled  for.  Laird  Clowes  has  thought  it 
meet  to  fling  the  words  of  our  countrymen,  the  Rev. 
Isaac  Williams  and  the  '  four  other  Negro  preachers,'  in 
our  faces  as  sufficient  proofs  of  African  immorality ;  but  we 
shall,  and  we  must^  by-and-by,  pay  him  back  in  his  own 
coin,  by  showing  how  Britishers  and  other  Caucasians  were 
in  the  past,  and  are  in  the  present,  also  immoral.  We  pro- 
pose to  cite  passages  from  the  writings  of  his  own  British 
countrymen  as  proving  whether  Britishers  are  greatly 
immoral  or  not. 

How  many  Caucasians  there  are  who,  although  they  may  not 
say  that  '  Seven  women  should  lay  hold  of  one  man,'  actually 
carry  out  in  practice  everything  embodied  in  the  sentence. 
There  are,  we  are  certain,  amongst  Caucasians,  those  who 
have  allowed  themselves  to  exceed  in  practice  the  limit  fixed 
by  the  '  coloured  man's'  motto;  and  there  are  also  those  who 
have  nearly  reached  the  limit.  Such  immoral  practices  have 
been,  and  are  being,  carried  out  by  Caucasians,  not  only  in 


IMMORALITY.  91 

this  our  civilized  nineteenth  century,  but  also  in  the  times 
of  the  buried  past.  What  a  great  contrast  does  the  in- 
significant '  coloured  man '  present  to  the  British  Elizabeth, 
the  last  of  the  Tudors,  who  in  practice  carried  out  (in  the 
days  of  Shakespeare)  the  '  coloured  man's '  saying,  but  in 
the  reversed  order  1  The  one  a  black  man,  and  an  American 
African,  and  a  subject  (not  a  citizen,  because  the  African  in 
America  is  not  allowed  to  exercise  the  rights  conferred  upon 
him  by  law  !)  of  the  United  States  of  North  America ;  the 
other  a  Caucasian  and  Britisher,  and  once  Queen  of  Eng- 
land and  Ireland.  The  one  was  presumably  an  illiterate 
man ;  the  other  was  one  of  the  cleverest  women  who 
ever  sat  on  a  throne,  and  was  at  least  an  accomplished 
linguist,  speaking  and  writing  five  languages  in  addition  to 
her  native  English.  And  yet  Elizabeth,  the  greatest  of  the 
Tudors,  was  destitute  of  all  moral  principles  ;  and  here  is 
our  proof:  'The  woman  who  despises  the  safeguards  must 
be  content  to  forfeit  the  reputation  of  chastity.  It  was  not 
long  before  her  familiarity  with  Dudley  provoked  dishonour- 
able reports.  At  first  they  gave  her  pain ;  but  her  feelings 
were  soon  blunted  by  passion  :  in  the  face  of  the  whole 
court  she  assigned  to  her  supposed  paramour  an  apartment 
contiguous  to  her  own  bedchamber,  and  by  this  indecent 
act  proved  that  she  was  become  regardless  of  her  character, 
and  callous  to  every  sense  of  shame.  But  Dudley,  though 
the  most  favoured,  was  not  considered  as  her  only  lover  ; 
among  his  rivals  were  numbered  Hatton  and  Raleigh,  and 
Oxford  and  Blount,  and  Simier  and  Anjou  :  and  it  was 
afterwards  that  her  licentious  habits  survived,  even  when 
the  fires  of  wantonness  had  been  quenched  by  the  chill  of 
age.  The  court  imitated  the  manners  of  the  sovereign. 
It  was  a  place  in  which,  according  to  Fount,  'all  enormi- 
ties reigned  in  the  highest  degree,'  or,  according  to  Harring- 
ton, '  where  there  was  no  love  but  that  of  the  lusty  god  of 


92  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

gallantry,  Asmodeus.'*  Such  was  the  reputation  of  Eliza- 
beth Tudor,  who  is  wrongly  called  the  '  virgin-queen.'  And 
this  account  is  culled  from  the  most  impartial  of  British 
historians. 

Whatever  excuse  could  be  accepted  from  the  African 
could  not  be  accepted  from  Elizabeth. 

The  Israelite,  King  David  the  psalmist,  more  than 
exceeded  the  '  coloured  man's '  suggestion,  that  *  Seven 
women  should  lay  hold  of  one  man  ;'  for  the  second  king 
of  Israel  had  many  wives  and  many  concubines.  His  wise 
son  and  successor,  King  Solomon  himself,  with  all  his 
wisdom,  could  not  exercise  control  over  his  sensual  pas- 
sions ;  and  he  even  greatly  surpassed  his  father  David  in 
the  multitude  of  wives  and  concubines — seven  hundred 
wives  and  three  hundred  concubines,  making  a  grand  sum 
total  of  one  thousand  women. t  But  Solomon  and  his 
father  David  were  Asiatics ;  and  we  therefore  pass  on  to 
Europeans. 

A  more  immoral,  depraved,  and  worthless  monarch  than 
the  British  Charles  II.  never  sat  on  any  European  throne. 
When  he  died,  this  '  Merry  Monarch'  left  several  illegitimate 
children,  of  whom  the  best  known  were  James,  Duke  of 
Monmouth,  by  Lucy  Walters  ;  Charlotte,  Countess  of  Yar- 
mouth, by  Lady  Shannon  ;  Charles,  Duke  of  Southampton; 
Henry,  Duke  of  Grafton;  George,  Duke  of  Northumber- 
land ;  and  Charlotte,  Countess  of  Lichfield,  by  the  Duchess 
of  Cleveland  {i.e.,  Mrs.  Palmer,  Countess  of  Castlemain) ; 
Charles,  Duke  of  St.  Albans,  by  Eleanor  (Nellie)  Gwyn; 
Charles,    Duke  of  Richmond,  by  the    Duchess   of  Ports- 

^  Dr.  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  xiii.,  chap,  vii., 
pp.  500,  501,  second  edition. 

t  2  Kings  xi.  1-4.  We  do  not,  however,  mean  to  say  that 
King  Solomon  bore  personal  marital  relations  with  them  all. 
Many  were  merely  nominal  wives. 


IMMORALITY.  93 

mouth  (Madame  Carwell) ;  Mary,  Countess  of  Derwent- 
water,  by  Mary  Davies.  Many  more  illegitimate  children, 
by  other  women,  the  Merry  Monarch  had,  who  gained  no 
such  public  prominence  as  these.*  But  we  now  turn  to 
more  modern  times. 

There  are  hosts  of  white  Americans  who  believe,  like  the 
*  coloured  man,'  in  the  plurality  of  wives.  The  Mormons  have 
for  many  years  both  believed  in  and  practised  polygamy ; 
it  is,  indeed,  a  prominent  article  of  the  Mormon  creed.  If 
Mormonism  be  a  religion  at  all,  it  is  certainly  an  immoral 
one,  sustaining  immoral  practices;  a  mixture  of  Protestant- 
ism and  Mahommedanism,  and  abhorred  by  both  Pro- 
testants and  Mahommedans.  The  founder  of  American 
Mormonism,  Joseph  Smith,  was  a  very  loose-thinking  and 
immoral  man.  From  the  leader  we  can  form  an  estimate 
of  his  followers,  and  they  are  loose-thinking  people  on  all 
the  great  moral  questions,  so  much  so  that  American  law  has 
had  to  be  directed  against  the  Mormon  polygamic  practices. 

It  may  be  mentioned  here  that  though  he  (Joseph  Smith) 
founded  Mormonism  in  1830,  polygamy  was  not  first  prac- 
tised amongst  the  Mormons,  because  it  was  not  then 
included  in  the  tenets  of  the  '  Book  of  Mormon.'  And 
though  cohabitation  was  indulged  in  by  Smith,  it  was  only 
when  he  perceived  that  his  licentiousness  did  not  find 
favour  with  his  followers,  and  when  it  was  necessary  to 
appease  the  just  resentment  of  his  lawful  wife,  that  he  sud- 
denly declared,  in  July,  1843  (^^  believe  that  is  the  date), 
to  his  only  too  credulous  and  lax  followers,  that  he  had  a 
'  revelation '  from  God,  who,  he  said,  not  only  sanctioned, 
but  even  commanded,  the  polygamic  practice.  It  was  then 
that  polygamy  began  to  fairly  blossom  among  the  '  Latter 
Day  Saints.'     And  such  was  its  rapid  and  general  spread 

*  Lingard's  'History  of  England,'  vol.  x.,  chap,  i.,  p.  115, 
fifth  edition. 


94  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

among  the  people  that,  when  Brigham  Young,  Joseph 
Smith's  successor  in  the  headship  of  American  Mormonism, 
died  in  1877,  he  left  seventeen  wives  and  fifty-six  children 
behind  him  to  mourn  his  loss.* 

Though  Mormonism  is  mainly  composed  of  Americans, 
there  are  Englishmen  and  Swiss,  Germans,  Norwegians 
and  Swedes,  Frenchmen  and  Danes,  in  the  Mormon  ranks, 
who  perhaps  number  half  a  million. 

The  Mahommedans,  too,  believe  in  the  plurality  of  wives ; 
for  when  Mahomet  died  he  left  numerous  wives  and  con- 
cubines behind  him;  and  a  part  of  the  Mahommedan  Bible, 
the  Koran,  actually  deals  with  his  (Mahomet's)  loose  rela- 
tions with  women.! 

It  is  probable  that  had  the  Mormon  Brigham  Young 
lived  a  few  years  longer  he  would  have  died  leaving  not 
seventeen,  but  at  least  twice  seventeen,  wives  behind  him  to 
mourn  his  loss ;  but  in  modern  times  he  certainly  yields 
the  palm  to  the  present  Sultan  of  Turkey,  Abdul  Hamid  II., 
who  rejoices  in  having  between  eighty  and  one  hundred 
wives  and  concubines  in  his  harem  at  Stamboul,  and,  as  if 
that  number  of  women  were  not  enough  to  satiate  his  im- 
moral appetite,  the  '  Commander  of  the  Faithful '  is  kept 
engaged  in  increasing  the  supply.  The  Shah  of  Persia,  of 
living  men,  owns  a  superior  only  in  the  Sultan  of  Turkey, 
as  far  as  the  plurality  of  wives  and  concubines  is  concerned. 
Thus  it  can  be  seen  that  the  Rev.  Isaac  Williams*  '  coloured 
man'  does  not  stand  alone  in  the  belief  that  ^  Many  women 
should  lay  hold  of  one  man  ;'  for  there  were  in  other  cen- 
turies, and  there  are  in  this  century,  men  and  women  of 
position  who  were,  and  who  are,  just  as  immoral  as  this 
obscure  and  nameless  'coloured  man.'  We  now  dismiss  the 
Rev.  Isaac  Williams  and  the  '  four  other  Negro  preachers,' 

*  '  Encyclopsedia  Britannica,'  vol.  xvi.,  p.  827,  ninth  edition. 

f  Ibid.^  pp.  561,  599,  ninth  edition. 


IMMORALITY.  95 

who  in  various  ways  furnished  Mr.  Clowes  with  a  weapon 
to  use,  in  accusing  us  Africans  of  immorality.  When  Cauca- 
sians come  forward,  like  Mr.  Froude,  Clowes,  Sir  Spencer 
St.  John,  and  others,  and  accuse  us  Africans  of  immorality, 
one  would  suppose  that  immorality  never  existed,  and  does 
not  exist,  to  any  extent,  amongst  the  countrymen  of  these 
same  Caucasians.  But  we  shall  show  that  immorality  does 
prevail  to  a  frightful  extent  amongst  them.  We  briefly 
alluded,  at  the  outset,  to  the  immorality  which  is  prevalent 
in  the  British  Isles ;  now  we  propose  to  deal  at  some  length 
with  the  British  immorality,  that  is,  with  immorality  as  it 
exists  in  the  country  of  Sir  Spencer  St.  John,  James 
Anthony  Froude,  and  Laird  Clowes.  The  actions  brought 
in  the  Divorce  Courts  of  every  country  testify  to  the 
immorality  which  is  prevalent  in  that  country.  The  British 
Isles  have  their  Divorce  Courts  ;  and  the  large  number  of 
petitions  annually  filed  in  these  Courts  must  testify  to  the 
widespread  extent  of  immorality  in  Britain.  Caucasians 
tell  us  Africans  that  we  are  immoral ;  we  say  that  we,  as  a 
race,  are  not  immoral.  We  say  that  immorality  is  as  old  as 
the  world,  and  must  be  a  force — a  demoralizing,  indeed, 
but  not  the  less  a  powerful,  force — in  the  world.  It  has 
marched  with  Caucasian  civilization  ;  it  is  marching 
shoulder  to  shoulder  with  civilization  to-day.  We  say 
that  immorality  has  had,  and  has,  its  abode  amongst  the 
Caucasians  as  fully  as  among  other  men ;  but  it  is  our  firm 
conviction  that  those  who  are  responsible  for  the  condition 
of  the  morals  of  the  Africans  who  are  living  under  Caucasian 
rule  are  his  Caucasian  rulers  and  governors.  It  is  the 
business  of  the  dominant  Caucasian  to  watch  over  the 
morals  of  the  subject  African,  because  morality  is  part 
and  parcel  of  civilization  ;  and  do  not  Caucasians  pose  as 
civilizers,  as  the  civilizers  of  the  African  ?  Great  moral 
responsibility,  then,  without  doubt,  rests  on  the  shoulders 


96  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

of    the  Caucasians,    while    instruction    and    precept   and 
example  lie  with  him,  and  must  originate  from  him  who 
governs,    and  who  is  the  great  boasted  civilizer.     If  the 
Caucasian  rulers  of  us  subject  Africans  fail  to  disseminate 
moral  instruction,  and,  what  is  of  much  greater  moment, 
if  they  fail  to  set  their  subjects  a  commendable  example  in 
the  path  of  virtue  and  chastity;  if,  instead,  they  themselves 
plunge  headlong  into  the  abyss  of  vicious  immorality,  what 
effect  must  their  derelictions  and  shortcomings,  their  wicked 
ways  and  bad  example,  have  on  us  Africans?   The  ignorant 
African  will  be  sure  to  follow  in  the  footsteps  of  those  above 
him.     '  Example,'  says  Rogers,  '  is  a  motive  of  a  very  pre- 
vailing force  on   the  actions  of  men.'     Have  the  British 
countrymen   of    James    Anthony   Froude   and   W.    Laird 
Clowes  set   their  African  subjects   the   good  or   the  bad 
example  ?     We  answer,  without  fear  of  contradiction,  that 
they  have  decidedly  set  them  not  the  good,  but  the  bad 
example ;  and  the  following  pages,  we  venture  to  say,  will 
prove  our  statement.     What  was  it  that  forced  the  Right 
Honourable  Robert  Bourke,  G.C.I. E.,  Lord    Baron  Con- 
nemara,  in  the  peerage  of  the  United   Kingdom  of  Great 
Britain   and   Ireland,  ex-Lord   Governnor  of  Madras,  the 
second  Presidency  and  Province  in  British  India,  to  resign 
the  Governorship  of  Madras  early  in  the  last  year  (1890)? 
Was  it  not  immorality  ?     Was  he  not  caught,  red-handed,  in 
adulterous  intercourse  with  his  own  Irish  servant,  and  did  he 
not  thereby  court  a  divorce  suit  at  the  hands  of  his  wife, 
which  was  in  fact  instituted  by  her,  and  heard  in  court,  with 
the  result  of  a  decree  nisi  ?    When  the  poor  ignorant  African 
hears  that  the  noble  lord,  the  Right  Honourable  Baron 
Connemara,  G.C.I.E.,  ex-Lord  Governor  of  Madras,  a  man 
of  the  greatest  intelligence,  and  a  legislator,  has  not  thought 
it   beneath  his  dignity  to  stoop  to  commit  a  disgraceful 
liaison  with  his  own  servant,  where  is  he  (the  ignorant  and 


IMMORALITY.  97 

benighted  African)  to  take  his  good  example  from  ?  Yes, 
we  ask,  where  are  his  good  morals  to  come  from  when  a 
noble  lord,  the  African's  universal  ruler  (because  he  is  a 
Caucasian,  and  a  Britisher  to  boot)  sets  him  a  bad  example? 
Mr.  Laird  Clowes  evidently  did  not  bear  in  mind  the 
divorce  petition  (heard  in  July,  1890)  of  Lady  Connemara  v. 
Lord  Connemara  and  Hannah  Moore,  a  servant,  when  he 
was  treating  of  the  moral  condition  of  the  Africans,  and 
quoting  Froude  as  saying,  in  reference  to  us  Africans,  that 
'  morals  in  the  technical  sense  they  have  none ;'  that 
'  there  is  no  sign,  not  the  slightest,  that  the  generality  of 
the  race  are  improving  either  in  intelligence'  (we  have  dealt 
with  the  African's  intelligence  in  the  second  chapter)  'or 
moral  habits ;  all  the  evidence  is  the  other  way.'  If 
their  own  countrymen  are  immoral,  what  right  has  either 
Froude  or  Clowes  to  expatiate  on,  or  even  refer  to,  the 
moral  condition  of  the  Africans  to  the  detriment  of  their 
character  ?  If  the  Caucasian  does  not  practise  what  he 
preaches,  how  dare  he  pretend  to  moralize  on  the  wicked- 
ness of  the  African  ? 

What  was  it  that  forced  the  Right  Honourable  Sir  Charles 
Wentworth  Dilke,  a  Baronet  of  the  United  Kingdom  of  Great 
Britain  and  Ireland,  author  and  editor,  an  ex-M.P.  for  Chelsea, 
ex-Under-Secretary  of  State  for  the  Colonies,  ex-President  of 
the  Local  Government  Board  in  Her  Britannic  Majesty's 
second  Gladstonian  Administration,  and  now  presumptive 
Gladstonian  Liberal  candidate,  with  a  view  to  the  represen- 
tation in  the  British  House  of  Commons  of  the  Forest  of 
Dean,  to  retire  into  private  Hfe  in  the  year  1886?  Was  it 
immorality?  Did  he  figure  as  a  co-respondent  in  the 
notorious  divorce  suit  of  'Crawford  v.  Crawford  and  Dilke,' 
in  January,  1886 ;  and  was  he  declared  by  judge  and 
jury  guilty  of  adultery  with  the  petitioner  Crawford's 
wife?     Mr.  James  Anthony  Froude  never  thought  of  the 

7 


98  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

divorce  petition  of  'Crawford  v.  Crawford  and  Dilke  '  when 
he  was  treating  of  the  morals  of  the  West  Indian  Africans 
in  his  '  English  in  the  West  Indies ' ;  nor  did  Mr.  W.  Laird 
Clowes  give  that  case,  or  that  of  Lady  Connemara  v.  Lord 
Connemara  and  Hannah  Moore,  a  servant,  a  moment's 
thought  when  he  was  denouncing  so  vigorously  the  morals 
of  the  American  Africans  in  his  '  Black  America.' 

When  the  poor  ignorant  African — in  far-off  Georgia, 
Mississippi,  Virginia,  South  Carolina,  Alabama,  North 
Carolina,  Louisiana,  Florida,  or  it  may  be  in  Cape  Colony, 
Natal,  the  Gold  Coast,  Bechuanaland,  Zululand,  Mauritius, 
Jamaica,  Trinidad,  Sierra  Leone,  Barbados,  Lagos, 
Gambia,  or  elsewhere  —  hears  that  his  universal  ruler,  a 
Caucasian  and  an  Anglo-Saxon,  gives  way  to  immoral 
practices;  or,  what  is  of  even  greater  moment,  hears  of 
the  scandal  connected  with  a  prominent  Member  of  Her 
Britannic  Majesty's  Government  of  1 880-1 885,  how  can  we 
wonder  if  he  falls  into  the  sin  of  immorality,  the  very  sin  of 
which  educated  and  high-ranked  Englishmen  are  guilty? 
and  is  not  that  same  African  to  be  commiserated  with  rather 
than  assailed  by  his  Caucasian  ruler  ? 

Why  do  not  Mr.  Froude  and  Mr.  Clowes,  instead  of 
treating  of  the  morals  of  the  African,  treat  of  the  morals  of 
the  Right  Honourable  Sir  Charles  Wentworth  Dilke,  Bart., 
G.C.B.,  and  of  the  Right  Honourable  Robert  Bourke,  Lord 
Baron  Connemara,  G.C.I.E.?  That  would  be  a  better  occu- 
pation for  them.  We  Africans  tell  the  Caucasians  to  practise 
at  home  what  they  preach,  and  not  play  the  part  of  the 
pharisee.  At  all  events  the  humble  subject-African's  re- 
sponsibility for  sinning  against  and  breaking  the  Sixth  and 
Ninth  Commandments  is  less  than  that  of  educated  and 
cultured  English  gentlemen,  who  belong  to  the  race  that 
claims  to  be  his  rulers,  his  civilizers  (?)  and  his  legislators. 
It  is   recognised   that  the  soldiers  of  an   army  have  less 


IMMORALITY.  99 

responsibilities  than  their  general,  because  their  general  is 
their  ruler  and  director.  We  must  confess  that  we  cannot 
understand  why  it  is  that  British  writers  are  so  hard  on 
the  African  when  they  treat  of  African  morals,  while  at  the 
same  time  their  own  countrymen  are  grossly  immoral. 

There  is  the  gravest  aggravation  of  some  of  these  English 
cases  of  immorality,  in  the  fact  that  too  often  the  licentious 
men  have  had  wives  actually  living  with  them  at  the  time  of 
their  wrong-doing,  who  are  made  by  them  to  suffer  the 
cruellest  indignities. 

Another  case  has  occupied  much  public  attention,  but  it 
need  only  be  briefly  referred  to  in  further  illustration  of  our 
argument.  The  Honourable  Charles  Stewart  Parnell,  the 
Member  for  Cork,  who  was  sometimes  spoken  of  as  the 
*  Uncrowned  King  of  Ireland,'  brought  irremediable  dis- 
honour on  his  name,  and  misfortune  for  his  cause,  by  failing 
to  appear  in  the  divorce  suit  of  'O'Shea  v.  O'Shea  and 
Parnell,'  and  letting  judgment  go  against  him  by  default. 
There  were  revelations  of  intrigues  made  at  that  trial  which 
would  have  been  regarded  as  utterly  disgraceful  if  they  had 
borne  relation  to  the  African,  and  yet  there  were  many  pre- 
pared to  condone  the  moral  offences  for  the  sake  of  the 
talents  of  the  offender.  We  are  indebted  to  the  'Noncon- 
formist conscience '  for  creating  a  healthy  public  opinion 
with  regard  to  the  official  position  of  a  convicted  adulterer, 
which  Mr.  Gladstone  emphasized  by  his  famous  and 
effective — though,  as  some  people  think,  dictatorial — letter. 

And  to  strengthen  our  case  still  more,  and  further  prove 
that  Immorality  wields  her  sceptre,  and  has  an  undisputed 
sway  over  the  Caucasian,  two  other  cases  of  the  greatest  im- 
portance have  just  been  made  public.  The  offences  of 
Sir  Charles  W.  Dilke,  Mr.  Charles  S.  Parnell,  and  Lord 
Connemara,  dwindle  into  insignificance  when  compared  with 
the  offencee  which  must  now  be  mentioned.     Two  British 

7—2 


loo  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Members  of  Parliament,  both  of  them  well-known  men, 
have  but  recently  (at  least  as  known  to  the  general  public) 
fallen  victims  to  the  conquering  power  of  immoral  passions. 
One  —  the  English  Liberal  Member,  or,  rather,  the  late 
Member,  for  North  Bucks,  has  just  (May  6,  1891)  been 
sentenced  to  twelve  months'  imprisonment,  he  having 
pleaded  guilty  to  half  a  dozen  criminal  counts  of  prurient 
immorality.  But  what  seem  to  render  his  crimes  more 
heinous,  shameful,  and  disgraceful  in  the  opinion  of  all 
right-thinking  men,  are  the  facts  (i)  that  he  has  passed  the 
middle  age  of  life  ;  (2)  that  he  is  a  married  man,  and  has 
a  true  and  loving  wife  ;  (3)  that  he  was  at  the  time  of  his 
iniquities  a  Member  of  the  British  House  of  Commons,  and 
also  a  Member  of  the  London  County  Council ;  (4)  besides 
these  offices,  he  was  a  J.P.,  and  Chairman  of  the  Anglesea 
Quarter  Sessions,  administering  the  very  law  which  he 
helped  to  legislate  in  the  British  Parliament ;  (5)  moreover, 
he  is  a  Captain  in  the  Queen's  Navy ;  (6)  he  is  the  eldest 
son  and  heir  of  a  baronet  occupying  a  high  social  position, 
and  more  than  blessed  with  this  world's  goods ;  (7)  and 
the  females  whom  he  sought  to  entrap  were  not  women  of 
twenty-one,  or  beyond  that  age,  but  girls  of  tender  years, 
girls  in  their  teens,  and  aged  under  and  about  sixteen. 

The  London  Daily  Chronicle  of  May  7,  1891,  comment- 
ing on  *  Regina  z\  Verney '  (tried  in  May,  1891),  and  on 
British  immorality  in  general,  amongst  other  things,  says  : 
'  It  is  even  more  painful  to  reflect  upon  the  spread  of  vice 
in  the  country.  The  heartless  cynicism,  which  is  ever  quick 
to  sneer  at  homely  virtue,  may  well  feel  reproved  by  the 
spectacle  of  the  widespread  demoralization  of  which  this 
latest  scandal  is  an  example ;  and  there  is  hope  in  the  fact, 
which  has  now  been  demonstrated,  that  the  law  of  the  land 
is  still  strong  enough  to  reach  one  of  the  worst  forms  of 
scoial  crime.' 


IMMORALITY.  loi 

Lloyd's  News  of  May  lo,  1891,  also,  commenting  on  the 
Verney  case,  and  the  widespread  immorality  existing  in  the 
United  Kingdom,  says  :  '  His  '  (Captain  Verney's)  '  was  not 
the  crime  of  impetuous  youth,  nor  even  of  mature  man- 
hood, whose  mental  balance  had  been  disturbed  by  the 
force  of  a  great  passion.  There  was  not  a  touch  of  even 
false  sentiment  to  mitigate  its  utter  baseness.  It  recalls  in 
its  callous  concupiscence  the  stinging  words  of  Byron: 
"  Prurient,  yet  passionless,  cold-studied  lewdness."  The 
head  and  front  of  Captain  Verney's  offending  in  the  eyes 
of  good  men  and  women  is,  that  he  deliberately  spread 
his  net  for  any  girls  that  might  be  caught  by  guile  or  by 
money.  Behind  innocent-looking  advertisements,  offering 
fair  prospects  of  employment  to  the  daughters  of  the  ordi- 
nary newspaper  reader,  this  man  was  lying  in  wait  for  his 
prey.  And  he  has  evidently  been  pursuing  this  course  for 
years,  all  the  while  posing  as  a  philanthropist,  and  even  as 
a  social  purist.  What  amount  of  success  he  has  had  with 
the  general  seduction  agency,  which  he  and  the  woman 
Rouillier  set  up,  it  is  impossible  to  say  ;  but  so  cruel  and 
cunning  a  spider  must  have  secured  his  share  of  human  flies. 
From  time  to  time  piteous  stories  have  been  told,  and  have 
also  been  authenticated,  of  young  English  girls  enticed 
abroad  to  Brussels,  Paris,  Havre,  or  some  other  Continental 
city,  where  they  have  speedily  fallen  a  prey  to  the  dealers 
in  human  flesh;  for  a  young  girl  without  money,  in  a  city 
where  hardly  anyone  speaks  her  language,  is  of  all  creatures 
the  most  helpless.  But  here  was  a  man  who  caused  his 
victims  to  be  taken  across  the  Channel,  so  that  they  might 
be  more  helpless,  and  apparently  more  easily  cast  off.' 
Lloyd's  News  continues :  '  There  are  men  of  Captain 
Verney's  stamp  who  have  never  yet  been  detected,  and  his 
fate  will  strike  a  wholesome  sense  of  terror  into  their  hearts.' 
It   is  only    a    small    section    of  the   English    people   who 


I02  777^  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

parade  as  social  purists,  and  venture  to  attack  their  African 
fellow-creatures,  who  are  frail  as  they;  and  their  proceedings 
are  sometimes  unwise;  but  when  a  criminal  like  Captain 
Verney  is  run  down,  and  it  is  made  plain  that  he  has  been 
seeking  to  entrap  any  innocent  girl  that  might  be  attracted 
by  his  agent,  then  we  all  become  social  purists,  and,  though 
we  may  be  saddened  at  the  spectacle  of  his  humiliation,  no 
right-minded  man  or  woman  can  demur  to  the  righteous 
retribution  which  has  fallen  upon  him.  His  expulsion 
from  the  House  of  Commons  should  render  him  incapable 
of  ever  sitting  again,  or  he  may  one  day  be  seeking  to  prove 
his  innocence  by  'writing  a  pamphlet,'  as  has  recently  been 
done  in  behalf  of  the  Honourable  Sir  Charles  Wentworth 
Dilke. 

It  may  not  be  too  much  to  mention  here,  that  the 
gallant  gentleman,  Captain  Edmund  Hope  Verney,  has 
just  (May  12,  1891)  been  expelled  the  British  House  of 
Commons.  And  he  richly  deserved  his  expulsion.  The 
other — the  Irish  Conservative  Member  for  East  Belfast, 
for  whose  arrest  a  warrant  has  been  issued,  has  not  yet 
ventured,  as  Captain  Verney  did,  to  direct  his  steps  home- 
wards to  Britain  to  stand  his  trial  for  the  immoral  crimes 
of  which  he  is  accused,  but  continues  living  in  ignoble  and, 
let  us  say,  constrained  exile,  because  he  knows  only  too 
well  that  the  moment  he  sets  foot  on  British  soil  he  will  be 
promptly  arrested.  Surely  if  he  believes  himself  innocent, 
and  the  victim,  as  he  alleges,  of  a  political  plot  concocted 
by  his  political  opponents — the  Gladstonian  Liberals  and 
the  Irish  Nationalists — he  would  long  ago  have  surrendered 
his  person,  taken  his  trial,  and  purged  his  reputation  from 
the  charge  or  charges  of  which  he  now  stands  accused  ;  but 
the  Honourable  Member  for  East  Belfast  prefers  doing 
otherwise,  and  remains  in  virtual  hiding  on  the  Continent. 
It  is  worthy  of  mention  that  the  Member  for  East  Belfast, 


IMMORALITY.  103 

like  Captain  Vemey,  was  accustomed  to  pose  as  a  social 
purist;  but,  lo  !  he  is  himself  accused  of  worshipping  at  the 
shrine  of  Immorality !  The  Member  for  East  Belfast  is  truly 
a  fine  specimen  of  a  legislator  fitted  to  legislate  for  the  moral 
well-being  of  the  Africans  who  are  living  under  the  British 
flag! 

Immorality,  we  had  occasion  to  mention  before,  exists  as 
extensively  in  France  as  it  does  in  Britain.  It  was  the  in- 
direct, or  it  may  be  the  direct,  cause  which  led  to  the  forced 
banishment  of  the  French  General  Boulanger.  It  was  his 
immoral  nature  which  (though  he  was  a  married  man) 
caused  him  to  be  inveigled  into  the  toils  of  more  than  one 
woman  other  than  his  wife  ;  and  this  it  was  that  really 
brought  on  his  exile  and  ruin  and  death.  And  it  was  a 
herculean  task  for  him  to  shake  off  the  yoke  of  immorality 
under  which  he  had  to  toil  even  to  the  very  end."^ 

There  are  many  who  believe  that  Leon  M.  Gambetta^ 
tribune  of  the  French  people,  a  man  of  singular  ability 
and  of  distinguished  parts,  once  Minister  of  the  Interior, 
and  afterwards  French  Premier  and  President  of  the 
Council,  was  a  very  immoral  man.  The  wound  from  the 
pistol-shot,  which  prostrated  Gambetta  and  terminated  his 
existence  not  many  years  ago,  was,  and  is,  by  many 
attributed  not  to  mere  accident.  It  is  thought  to  have 
been  a  self-inflicted  wound,  and  his  death  was  a  suicide. 
While  his  friend,  but  supposed  mistress.  Mademoiselle 
Leonine  Leon,  is  by  many  reported  and  believed  to 
have  goaded  him  on  to  the  fell  deed  by  her  alleged 
misbehaviour.  As  this  is  a  matter  of  uncertainty  (in  con- 
sequence of  the  conflicting  nature  of  the  reports  that  have 
been  spread  concerning  the  private  character  of  Gambetta), 
we  venture  to  do  no  more  than  refer  to  a  passing  suspicion. 

*  Boulanger's  suicidal  death  on  the  grave  of  the  woman  who 
kept  him  is  the  final  declaration  of  his  shameless  immorality. 


I04  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Kings  and  queens  have  their  little  weaknesses  in  the 
matter  of  immorality,  like  other  mortals.  Immorality 
caused  the  graceless  Servian  Milan  to  perform  his  un- 
dignified escapades,  which  served  to  belittle  him  in  the  eyes 
of  Europe  and  of  the  world.  And  when  Queen  LiUua- 
kalani,  of  the  Hawaiian  Islands,  attempted  recently  to  force 
the  recognition  of  her  illicit  son  as  her  successor  and  heir- 
apparent  on  the  Hawaiian  throne,  that  attempt,  or  proposal, 
very  nearly  drove  her  subjects  into  open  rebellion,  which 
would  have  aimed  at  the  establishment  of  a  republic. 
At  all  events,  the  chocolate-coloured  Sandwichers  gave 
their  queen  to  understand  that  they  would  have  none  of 
her  'full-blooded  Kanaka'  as  her  successor  and  their  ruler. 
Austro-Hungarian  Crown  Prince  Rudolph,  the  pride  and 
hope  of  the  Hapsburgs,  became  immoral,  and  because  of 
the  Baroness  Vetsera  committed  suicide  in  1888. 

Reference  may  also  be  made  to  the  dismissal  of  Captain 
Arthur  Wybrow  Baker  from  her  Majesty's  Service  in 
Trinidad,  the  causes  for  that  dismissal  being  well  known 
to  bear  relation  to  other  things  as  well  as  official  untrust- 
worthiness.  Did  he  set  the  subject  Afro-Trinidadians  a 
worthy  example  ? 

Whatever  immorality  there  may  be  in  the  West  Indies, 
the  West  India  Committee  is  largely  responsible  for  it:  and 
we  are  not  alone  in  that  belief;  for  the  Trinidad  Public 
Ophiion  of  March  20,  1891 — a  journal  edited  by  a 
Caucasian — commenting  on  the  morals  of  the  St.  Lucian 
Africans  and  the  West  India  Committee,  says :  '  There  is 
little  or  no  incentive  to  the  people  to  lead  moral  lives ;  and 
in  many  cases  the  example  set  them  by  those  to  whom 
they  should  look  up  (the  example  set  the  Trinidadian 
Africans  by  this  Baker,  for  instance)  is  a  deplorable  one. 
To  many  people  in  England,  in  fact,  everywhere  but  in  the 
West  Indies,  the  West  India  Committee  represents  the  sub- 


IMMORALITY.  105 

Rmated  wisdom  and  morality  of  the  Caribbean  Archi- 
pelago. The  members  composing  it  should  therefore,  for 
propriety's  sake,  if  nothing  else,  be  able  to  point  to  efforts 
made  and  example  shown  for  the  moral  elevation  of  the 
masses.  As  the  twig  is  bent,  so  will  the  tree  be  inclined  ; 
and  if  the  people  see  before  them  constant  instances  of  un- 
chastity  on  the  part  of  those  to  whom  they  naturally  look  up 
for  example,  it  is  not  surprising  that  they  should  follow  suit.' 

We  are  of  opinion  that  the  three  countries  where  the 
grossest  immorality  is  to  be  met  with  are  the  United  King- 
dom, France,  and  the  United  States  of  North  America. 
London,  Paris,  and  New  York  are  the  three  cities  in  which 
the  rankest  immorality  exists.  But  of  these  three  capitals 
Paris  and  New  York  yield  the  palm  in  vice  to  London, 
which  leads  the  van  in  the  immoral  race,  the  Metropolis 
of  France  and  the  Empire  City  being  left  far  and  away  in 
the  rear.  Prostitution,  rampant  and  prolific,  with  daring 
effrontery,  stalks  abroad  unchallenged,  greeting  and  elbow- 
ing you  at  every  turn,  walk  where  you  may,  in  the  streets  of 
London,  from  the  early  morn  of  God's  daylight  to  the  hours 
during  which  stark  night  is  permitted  to  exercise  her  sway. 

Who,  we  ask,  were  the  unfortunate  Whitechapel  victims 
of  the  East-end  but  loose,  immoral  women  ?  It  was  their 
immoral  nature  which  led  them  to  their  pitiable  doom,  and 
caused  them  to  fall  easy  and  pliant  victims  to  the  mur- 
derous knife  of  the  Ripper-assassin. 

We  say  that  immorality  prevails  in  London,  as  the  capital 
of  the  British  Empire,  to  a  greater  extent  than  it  does  in 
any  other  portions  of  the  British  Empire ;  and  the  reader 
may  be  reminded  that,  when  the  decision  in  the  divorce 
cause  9f  'O'Shea  v.  O'Shea'  became  known,  the  Irish 
people,  with  an  almost  unanimous  voice,  gave  it  as  their 
conviction  that  it  was  London  which  had  corrupted  the 
morals  of  Mr.  Parnell  their  leader. 


io6  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Vicious  immorality  predominates  in  both  the  West-end 
and  the  East-end  of  the  British  Metropolis  more  than  it 
does  in  the  other  parts  of  London ;  but  these  other  parts 
are  in  a  sufficiently  degraded  condition.  We  referred 
briefly  to  the  state  of  the  East-end,  and  to  the  Whitechapel 
murders  as  the  outcomes  of  immorality,  considering  that  a 
brief  reference  would  be  sufficient.  We  shall  now  allow 
the  Britisher  to  give  us  his  opinion  of  the  immorality  pre- 
valent in  his  own  country  and  in  London,  and  shall  quote 
one  of  the  daily  newspapers  published  in  London.  The 
London  Daily  Telegraph  of  May  14,  1891,  under  the 
heading  of  '  The  State  of  the  West-end  Streets,'  tells  us 
that  :  *  Mr.  E.  C.  Keevil,  a  gentleman  having  business  pre- 
mises in  Regent  Street,  attended  (on  May  13),  in  company 
with  Inspector  Shannon,  before  Mr.  Hannay  (Police 
Magistrate  of  Marlborough  Street  Court),  to  make  a  com- 
plaint respecting  the  congregation  of  immoral  women  in 
Regent  Street  and  the  neighbouring  thoroughfares.  Ad- 
dressing the  magistrate,  Mr.  Keevil  said,  "  I  desire,  sir,  to 
address  you,  on  behalf  of  my  fellow-tradesmen,  in  support 
of  a  complaint  of  one  of  the  inspectors  of  the  C  Division, 
with  respect  to  the  state  of  Regent  Street,  caused  by  the 
number  of  prostitutes  who  frequent  that  and  neighbouring 
streets,  and  seriously  cripple  the  carrying  on  of  business. 
I  am  not  desired  to  come  here  as  a  purist,  a  philanthropist, 
or  anything  of  that  kind,  but  merely  as  one  seeking  pro- 
tection for  his  business.  We  ask  your  assistance  to  have 
the  present  state  of  things  remedied,  and  dealt  with  in  the 
way  such  things  are  in  Glasgow,  Edinburgh,  and  other 
boroughs,  where  the  police  are  under  the  control  of  the 
municipal  authorities.  There  the  evil,  which  I  know  always 
has  existed  and  always  will  exist,  is  under  decent  control. 
We  only  want  it  to  be  under  such  control  here  that  foot- 
passengers  may  not  be  openly  molested,  as  they  are  now,  if 


IMMORALITY,  107 

they  stop  for  an  instant  to  look  at  a  shop-window." — Mr. 
Hannay  :  "  I  may  say  that  you  have  my  entire  sympathy, 
and  I  am  here  ready  to  punish  all  such  women  who  are 
brought  before  me.  Your  application  should,  however,  be 
made  to  the  Commissioner  of  Police.  There  are  laws,  and 
I  am  here  to  enforce  them  ;  but  I  have  no  control  in  the 
streets." — Mr.  Keevil  :  "We  went  to  a  former  Commis- 
sioner, Colonel  Henderson,  and  he  said  that  the  law  was 
imperfect,  and  that  the  state  of  things  was  not  as  much 
under  his  control  as  he  would  have  liked  it  to  be." — "There 
is  the  difficulty  that  private  persons  will  very  rarely  come 
forward  to  support  complaints  against  women  of  the  class 
you  refer  to ;  while  it  has  occurred,  unfortunately,  that  the 
unsupported  testimony  of  a  policeman  in  charges  of  the 
kind  has  been  viewed  with  suspicion.  I  may  say  that  I 
always  judge  every  case  upon  its  merits  ;  and  if  I  see  no 
reason  to  doubt  the  evidence  of  the  policeman,  I  act  upon 
what  he  says.  It  is  a  matter  that  I  would  rather  not  discuss 
in  public,  but  I  must  say  that  our  streets  are  really  a 
disgrace  to  us." — Mr.  Keevil  :  "  It  is  our  belief,  sir,  that 
shutting  up  the  houses  where  these  women  were  wont  to 
congregate  is  only  making  matters  worse." — "Mr.  Hannay: 
"Now  you  are  touching  upon  a  delicate  matter;  and  I 
would  rather  not  discuss  it." — Mr.  Keevil  then  withdrew. 
A  foreign  woman,  giving  the  name  of  was  subse- 
quently charged  with  annoying  gentlemen  outside  the 
London  Stereoscopic  Company's  premises.  —  Inspector 
Shannon  handed  to  the  magistrate  a  letter  received  by 
Superintendent  Hume  from  the  manager  of  that  company, 
complaining  of  the  customers  being  driven  away  by  women. 
Gentlemen  were  caught  hold  of  and  spoken  to,  it  was 
averred,  while  ladies  would  not  stand  beside  women  of  the 
class  complained  of. — Inspector  Shannon  said  that  he 
had    understood    that    the    manager   of   the    Stereoscopic 


io8  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Company  intended  to  appear  and  support  the  charge,  but 
he  was  not  present. — Mr.  Hannay :  "That  is  just  the  point. 
People  make  complaints,  but  will  not  come  to  Court  to 
support  them.  Go  down,  and  tell  him  that  I  am  surprised 
that  he  will  not  come  half  the  length  of  Regent  Street  to 
support  his  complaints." — Mr.  Shannon  :  "  But  he  will  not 
come,  sir." — Mr.  Hannay :  "  They  leave  the  police  to  do 

everything,  and  will  not  help  themselves  at  all." —     

was  fined  40s.' 

What  with  the  often  occurring  seductions,  what  with  the 
legionary  divorce  causes  annually  heard,  we  surely  have 
abundant  public  proofs  of  the  immoral  natures  of  Britishers 
and  other  Europeans  in  the  United  Kingdom. 

We  take  it  that  it  is  more  than  sufficiently  disgraceful  and 
shameful  that  Members  of  Governments,  Members  of  Parlia- 
ment, Lords,  Baronets,  Magistrates,  arfd  Officers  in  her 
Britannic  Majesty's  Forces,  should  figure  as  respondents  or 
co-respondents  in  divorce  petitions,  and  figure  as  prisoners 
at  the  bar  on  criminal  charges  under  the  Criminal  Law 
Amendment  Act ;  while  it  is  just  as,  or,  may  we  say  it  ?  more 
disgraceful  and  shameful  when  Protestant  clergymen  or 
ministers  of  religion,  preachers  of  the  Gospel  and  morality, 
figure  as  respondents  or  co-respondents  in  divorce  suits,  as 
well  as  when  they  are  put  on  their  trial  and  proved  guilty  of 
immoral  offences  under  the  Criminal  Law  Amendment  Act. 

We  say  that  British  Protestant  ministers  of  religion  have 
figured  either  as  respondents  or  co-respondents  in  divorce 
cases  ;  and  as  we  do  not,  like  Laird  Clowes  and  James 
Anthony  Froude,  allege  anything  against  anyone  without 
substantiating  it,  we  refer  the  reader — the  sceptic  or  un- 
beliei-ing  reader — to  a  well-known  case  tried  in  March  of 
this  year  (1891),  in  which  a  British  Protestant  clergyman 
figured  as  the  respondent.  That  one  example^  we  hope  and 
trust,   will   suffice    for  all.     When   a  clergyman,    a  British 


IMMORALITY.  109 

lergyman  and  preacher  of  the  Gospel,  who  is  supposed  to 
be  chaste  and  pure,  stoops  to  violate  either  the  Sixth  or  the 
Ninth  Commandment,  and  as  a  consequence  figures  either 
as  the  respondent  or  as  co-respondent,  according  to  the  tenor 
of  the  case,  in  a  Divorce  Court,  his  example,  already  bane- 
ful, is  likely  to  become  contagious  to  the  benighted  African, 
who  only  too  readily  will  follow  suit. 

We  again  say  that  British  clergymen  are  even  caught  red- 
handed  in  criminal  adultery,  and  convicted  of  indecent 
assaults  under  the  Criminal  Law  Amendment  Act.  And  as 
we  do  not  (as  we  have  already  said),  like  James  Anthony 
Froude  and  Laird  Clowes,  allege  anything  against  anybody 
without  substantiating  our  charge,  we  refer  the  doubting  or 
unbelieving  reader  to  the  case  (tried  in  June  24th,  189 1, 
at  the  Berks  Assizes)  of  a  Protestant  clergyman  who  was 
indicted  for  such  immoral  offences.  That  one  instance,  too, 
we  trust,  will  suffice  for  all  such.'" 

When  we  see  Immorality  affecting  not  only  Magistrates, 
Members  of  the  County  Council,  Officers  in  Her  Britannic 
Majesty's  Forces,  Members  of  Parliament,  Members  of 
Government,  Lords,  Baronets,  and  also  Ministers  of  the 
Gospel  and  of  religion,  is  there  not  cause  for  wonder  that 
the  benighted  African,  if  he  happen  to  violate  the  Sixth  or 
the  Ninth  Commandment,  should  be  so  closely  and  unre- 
mittingly run  to  earth  and  denounced  by  those  very  Cau- 
casians who  themselves  violate  both  the  Sixth  and  the  Ninth 
Commandments  ? 

■^  As  an  outcome  of  clerical  immorality  the  British  Clergy 
Discipline  (Immorality)  Bill,  under  the  pilotage  of  His  Grace  the 
Lord  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  has  been  read  a  third  time  and 
passed  (March  20,  1891)  the  Lords  in  the  Sixth  Session  oY  the 
Twelfth  Parliament  of  Queen  Victoria's  reign,  and  there  is 
every  reason  to  hope  and  believe  that  that  Bill  will  pass  the 
*  faithful  Commons'  this  (Seventh)  Session  and  become  law. 


no  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

When  those  in  high  places  sin,  they  must  be  held  re- 
sponsible for  the  sins  of  the  lowly.  When  rulers — 
Caucasian  rulers — are  immoral,  there  will  surely  be  those 
who  are  immoral  amongst  the  subject  Africans,  though  it  is 
never  the  great  majority  of  them.  Like  master,  like  man. 
We  Africans,  then,  seeing  how  excessively  rank  Immorality 
is  amongst  the  Europeans,  and  with  what  undisputed  sway 
she  holds  her  rule  amongst  all  of  European  descent,  tell  the 
Caucasians  to  practise  what  they  preach,  because  example 
produces  more  effect  than  precept.  No  white  man  is 
authorized  to  tell  his  black  brother  that  he  has  a  mote  in 
his  eye,  while  so  big  a  beam  abides  in  his  own  (the  white 
man's)  eye."^ 

Let  the  good  example  be  set  the  subject  African,  living 
under  Caucasian  rule,  by  his  governors,  and  it  will  have  the 
desired  effect ;  and  let  Caucasians  put  a  stop  to  their  hypo- 
critical cant  in  complaining  of  African  immorality. 

How  comes  it,  we  ask,  that  there  are  to-day  lawyers, 
doctors,  clergymen,  authors,  engineers,  artists,  teachers, 
scholars,  merchants,  and  what  not,  of  African  blood  ?  We 
say  that  the  true  and  only  answer  is,  that  the  descendant 
of  Ham  has  seen  the  examples  set  him  by  his  rulers,  has 
followed  and  continues  to  follow  them,  and,  as  a  conse- 
quence, he  is  now  to-day  working  out  his  own  future,  and  is 
fast  entering  into  keen  competition  with  his  Caucasian  rulers 
in  every  kind  of  profession  and  occupation  that  the  African 
is  not  debarred  from.  No  sane  man  will  for  a  moment 
entertain  the  thought  that  the  British  Africans,  when  they 
were  liberated  in  1838,  and  the  American  Africans,  when 
they  were  liberated  in  1863,  were  ever  given  a  recompense 
for  being  so  forcibly,  unjustly,  and  with  such  diabolical 
cunningness  and  fell  purpose,  taken  from  their  hearths  and 
homes  in  beloved  Africa,  and  held  in  servile  bondage. 
•^  Matt.  vii.  3-5. 


IMMORALITY.  rii 

No.  It  is  the  force  of  example  alone  which  is  inspiring  the 
freed  men  ;  for  the  African,  when  the  Gift  of  Enfranchise- 
ment fell  on  his  lap,  had  to  toil  on  his  way  as  a  labourer  up 
the  ladder  of  civilization  and  general  progress,  without 
material  and  substantial  aid;  using  his  progressive  and 
ascending  powers — the  resultants  of  the  forces  of  example 
— to  their  present  lofty  pitch  to  the  admiration  of  the  world. 
Yes,  commendable  and  worthy  example,  we  may  say,  '  gives 
an  impulse  towards  progress  to  the  whole  mass '  of  Africans 
all  the  world  over. 

Despite  the  fact  that  the  Americans  set  their  then  African 
slaves  a  bad  example,  the  standard  of  morals  to-day  is  very 
high  in  Liberia,  because  the  American  Africans  left  behind 
the  chrysalides  of  all  the  wicked  and  corrupting  examples 
set  them  by  the  Yankees,  to  rot  and  stench  in  their  own 
land  ;  and  as  they  were  all  innately  pious,  God-fearing  men, 
as  well  as  men  of  the  greatest  intelligence,  they  were 
enabled  to  easily  civilize  their  aboriginal  countrymen  in 
Liberian  Africa,  and  reclaim  them  from  evil ;  the  Liberian 
moral  standard  is  as  high  as  that  of  any  other  country  in  the 
world. 

The  standard  of  morals  in  Hayti,  though  high,  yet  falls 
short  of  that  of  Liberia.  The  Frenchmen,  when  they  were 
forced  to  quit  Hayti,  and  were  driven  into  the  sea,  left 
behind  them  the  unhallowed  legacy  of  immorality,  which 
pernicious  legacy  and  example  taxed  all  the  energies  of 
Toussaint  the  Great,  Dessalines,  Christophe,  Boyer,  and 
Petion  to  drive  away. 

But  it  is  not  only  in  the  present  age  that  immorality  has 
been  a  force  and  a  power  amongst  Caucasians  as  well  as 
amongst  Asiatics.  Immorality  has  been  the  means  of 
changing  the  histories  of  peoples,  and  has  altered  the 
geographical  boundaries  of  countries.  More  :  it  has  been 
the  chief  cause  of  the  effacement  of  more  than  one  country 


1 1 2  THE  L  ON  EST  A  R  OF  LIBERIA . 

from  off  the  earth  in  bygone  days.  Immorality,  the  chief 
sin  of  Sodom  and  Gomorrah,  brought  down  the  anger  of 
Heaven  on  those  cities;  brimstone  and  fire  rained  on  them, 
and  Sodom  and  Gomorrah  were  wiped  off  the  face  of  the 
earth,  and  can  never  be  restored."^ 

Unlawful  fondness  of  Bathsheba,  the  wife  of  his  officer 
Urias,  caused  the  Israelite  King  David  to  break  not  only 
the  Sixth  and  Ninth  Commandments,  but  the  Fifth  as  well. 
After  debauching  Bathsheba,  the  licentious  Israelite  re- 
solved to  put  his  devoted  officer  Urias  to  death.  The 
king  succeeded  only  too  well  in  his  dark  design  ;  but  im- 
morality transformed  the  hitherto  stainless  David  into  a 
murderer.  His  matchless  wisdom  availed  his  son  and  suc- 
cessor, King  Solomon,  but  little,  for  it  did  not  prevent 
Immorality  from  enveloping  him  in  herunhallowed  embraces. 
The  adulterous  Solomon,  because  of  his  being  the  slave  of 
women — for  he  had,  we  are  told,  seven  hundred  wives  and 
three  hundred  concubines,  making  a  grand  total  of  one 
thousand  womenf — from  being  a  devout  believer  in  the 
God  of  his  fathers,  Abraham,  Isaac,  Jacob,  and  David, 
swerved  from  the  path  of  rectitude  and  truth,  became  an 
idolater,  and  fell  to  worshipping  the  idols  of  his  women. 
But  his  sins  involved  the  loss  of  ten  tribes  of  Israel  to  his 
son  and  successor  Rehoboam. 

Immorality  on  the  part  of  the  lewd  and  licentious 
Trojan,  Paris,  and  his  innamorata,  the  equally  lewd  and 
licentious  Helen  of  Sparta,  King  Menelaus'  wife  and  queen, 
brought  Mycenean  Agamemnon  and  his  myriads  of  em- 
battled squadrons  of  fierce  and  bloodthirsty  troopers  of  Old 
Greece  (and  in  their  train  disaster  and  ruin)  thundering  for 
a  decade  before  the  gates  of  the  ill-fated  city  of  the  valiant 
and  mighty  Trojans,  which  was  finally  taken,  sacked,  and 
wiped  out  of  existence.  It  also  lost  Antony  the  decisive 
*  Gen.  xix.  24,  25.  f  2  Kings  xi.  1-4. 


IMMORALITY.  1 1 3 

>attle  of  Actium,  his  great  empire,  and  his  possible  chances 
of  winning  another  equally  great.  And,  moreover,  it  caused 
that  brave  and  capable,  but  indolent  and  immoral,  Marcus 
Antonius,  the  Mark  Antony  of  Shakespeare,  to  fall  into 
despair  and  to  commit  suicide. 

Most  of  the  British  sovereigns  have  an  unenviable  and  im- 
moral reputation,  beginning  from  the  Red  King,  the  Second 
Norman  William,  and  ending  with  the  so-called  'First 
Gentleman  in  Europe,'  the  Fourth  Hanoverian  German 
George.  Very  few  indeed  are  free  from  the  charge  of 
immorality;  the  Third  and  Sixth  Henrys,  the  Fifth  and 
Sixth  Edwards,  the  two  Marys,  the  Third  William,  Anne, 
and  the  Third  George,  the  Farmer,  being  the  only  excep- 
tions, as,  also,  are  Stephen,  the  Fourth  Henry,  and  the  First 
Edward,  the  '  Greatest  of  the  Plantagenets,'  but  these  last 
three  are  doubtful. 

The  immoral  relations  of  the  Second  Henry  with  loose 
women,  especially  the  Fair  Rosamond  Clifford,  caused  his 
wife,  Queen  Eleanor,  to  urge  her  sons  to  rebel  against  her 
husband  and  their  father.*  The  Lion-hearted  Richard,!  the 
'  mirror  of  chivalry,'  whom  the  great  Sir  Walter — the  great 
Scott  of  Abbotsford — immortaUzes  in  '  Ivanhoe,'  and  his 
Lackland  Brother  John,|  who  was  bearded  at  Runnymede 
by  his  stubborn  subjects,  and  from  whose  grasp  Magna 
Charta  was  wrested  by  sturdy  and  plucky  Britishers,  were 

*  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  ii.,  chap,  v.,  pp.  382, 
383,  434-436,  second  edition  ;  'Dictionary  of  (British)  National 
Biography,'  vol.  xxvi.,  p.  10;  ibid.^  vol.  xi.,  pp.  75,76;  ibid.^ 
vol.  xxi.,  p.  139  et  seq.;  '  Student's  Hume,'  pp.  119-121. 

t  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  ii.,  chap,  v.,  p.  426  ; 
ibid.^  chap,  vi.,  p.  501  ;  Morris's  'History  of  England,' p.  93; 
*  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  xx.,  pp.  540,  541,  ninth  edition. 

X  Lingard's  'History  of  England,'  vol.  iii.,  chap,  i.,  pp.  91-93  ; 
Morris's  '  History  of  England,'  p.  99;  '  Student's  Hume,'  p  144  ; 
'  Dictionary  of  (British)  National  Biography,'  vol.  xxix.,  p.  416. 

8 


!I4  THE  LONE- STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

just  as  dissolute  as  the  Red  King,  the  Second  Norman 
WiUiam,  and  the  First  Henry.*  Her  licentious  passion  for 
her  paramour,  Roger  Mortimer,  caused  the  disreputable 
Queen  Isabellat  to  wage  unnatural  and  unjustifiable  war  on 
her  henpecked  husband,  taking  him  prisoner.  And  finally, 
the  same  guilty  passion  was  the  cause  of  the  brutal  and 
cowardly  murder  of  the  weakling  Edward  II.,  while  he  was 
a  close  and  defenceless  prisoner  at  the  Castle  Berkeley. 

The  Third  Edward,  under  whom  the  decisive  and  well- 
fought  battles  of  Calais  and  Poitiers  added  to  the  lustre  of 
British  arms,  in  the  winter  of  his  life,  and  in  the  dotage  of 
old  age,  yielded  to  woman's  influence,  and  allowed  his 
mistress,  the  imperious  Alice  Ferrers,  to  rule,  or  rather,  to 
misrule,  his  kingdom  ;|  just  as  the  Second  Henry  of  France, 
wedded  though  he  was  to  a  Catherine  de  Medici,  suffered 
the  fair  but  sinful  Diana  of  Poitiers,  his  mistress,  to  control 
the  affairs  of  his  kingdom,  from  the  beginning  of  his  reign  to 
the  day  of  his  death  and  the  end  of  his  reign.  §  The  Fourth 
Henry  of  France  was  an  immoral  man,  and  his  excesses 

■'^  Morris's  'History  of  England,'  p.  63;  Lingard's  'History  of 
England,'  vol.  ii.,  chap,  iii.,  pp.  207,  212,  213;  Freeman's  '  History 
of  the  Norman  Conquest  of  England,'  vol.  v.,  p.  155;  'Dic- 
tionary of  (British)  National  Biography/  vol.  xxv.,  pp.  450,  451  ; 
'Student's  Hume,'  p.  loi. 

t  'Student's  Hume,'  p.  170;  Lingard's  'History  of  England,' 
vol.  iii.,  chap,  iv.,  p.  449  ;    ibid.^  vol.  iv.,  chap,  i.,  pp.  9-19  ; 

*  Dictionary  of  (British)  National  Biography,'  vol.  xxix.,  p.  65 
et  seq. 

X  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  iv.,  chap,  ii.,  p.  142; 
'  Enyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  vii.,  p.  684,  ninth  edition  ;  '  Dic- 
tionary of  (British)  National  Biography,'  vol.  xvii.,  pp.  66-69. 

§  '  English    Cyclopaedia   of    Biography,'    vol    iii.,    p.   350  ; 

*  Enyclopaedia    Britannica,'    vol.    xi.,    p.   670,   ninth    edition; 

*  History  of  France— from   the  Origin  of  that  Nation  to  the 
Year   1702,'  vol.  i. ;  William  Tooke's  'Monarchy  of  France,' 

p.  yn- 


IMMORALITY.  115 

hastened  his  death.*  His  early  dissoluteness  cut  off  tlie  bril- 
liant career  in  arms  and  administration  of  Henry  V.  of 
England,  and  sent  him  to  an  early  grave.!  His  unrestrained 
indulgences  brought  the  licentious  and  indolent  Fourth 
Edward  to  his  death  at  a  comparatively  early  age.|  The 
Third  Richard, §  like  his  rival  Henry  VII.,  was  of  a  dis- 
reputable nature,  while  the  Eighth  Henry  was  a  royal  Blue- 
beard, who  stopped  at  nothing  to  attain  his  ends.  When 
the  Defender  of  the  Faith,  Henry  VIII.,  married  his 
brother's  widow,  he  might  have  had  at  least  a  particle  of 
genuine  and  lawful  affection  for  her ;  but  when  he  tired  of 
her,  and  was  captivated  by  the  charms  of  the  young  and  beau- 
tiful, but  cunning  and  ambitious  Anne  Boleyn,  who  would 
not  consent  to  be  mistress  but  would  only  be  his  wife,  the 
Bluebeard  sought  a  divorce  from  his  Queen  Catherine — the 
wife  who  is  admitted  to  have  been  '  without  fear  and  with- 
out reproach.'  When,  in  1527,  the  reigning  Pope,  Clement 
VII.,  would  not  grant  the  prayer  of  his  petition  for  a  divorce 
from  his  wife,  the  Eighth  Henry  illegally  divorced  the 
stainless  and  devoted  Catherine  by  a  private  scheme,  and 
contracted  an  ecclesiastically  unlawful  marriage  with  Anne 
Boleyn.  And  when  Clement  remained  as  immovable  as 
the  sphynx,  and  kept  pronouncing  against  his  divorce,  and 
declaring  Henry's  subsequent  marriage  with  Anne  null 
and  void,  the   Second  Tudor  supported   the  doctrines  of 

■^  '  History  of  France — from  the  Origin  of  that  Nation  to  the 
Year  1702,'  vol.  ii.,  p.  714  ;  Chambers's  '  Encyclopaedia,'  vol.  v., 
pp.  316,  317;  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  xi.,  p.  671,  ninth 
edition. 

f  Lingard's  *  History  of  England,'  vol.  iv.,  chap,  iv.,  pp.  425, 
426  et  seq.j  'English  Cyclopaedia  of  Biography,'  vol.  iii.,  p.  365. 

X  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  v.,  chap,  iii.,  p.  317; 
Morris's  'History  of  England,'  p.  171  ;  '  Dictionary  of  (British) 
National  Biography,'  vol.  xvii.,  p.  82. 

§  '  English  Cyclopaedia  of  Biography,'  vol.  v.,  p.  89. 

8-2 


u6  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

Luther,  and  proclaimed  himself  the  head  of  the  English 
Church,  though  but  six  (that  was  in  152 1)  years  before  he 
arrayed  himself  against  Luther,  refuted  his  doctrines,  and 
earned  the  title  of  '  Defender  of  the  Faith  '  at  the  hand  of 
the  Tenth  Leo.  When,  however,  Anne  Boleyn's  maid, 
Jane  Seymour,  caught  the  fancy  of  the  immoral  'Defender 
of  the  Faith,'  he,  under  the  pretext  of  her  supposed  incon- 
tinency,  beheaded  Anne,  surnamed  of  Boleyn,  who  was  never 
his  lawful  wife,  and  married  Jane  Seymour  the  very  next  day. 
After  the  death  of  Jane  Seymour,  Henry  VIII.  married, 
as  all  the  world  knows,  Catherine  Howard,  and  he  put  her 
to  death  on  the  plea  that  she  had  been  unchaste  before  her 
marriage  with  him ;  and  almost  immediately  after  he  had 
beheaded  Catherine  Howard  he  married  Anne  of  Cleves. 
But  after  a  brief  period  of  cohabitation  with  his  wife  Anne 
of  Cleves,  the  passionate  and  licentious  monarch  divorced, 
pensioned,  and  put  aside  his  *  Great  Flanders  Mare,'  and 
married  Catherine  Parr.  The  Eighth  Henry  was  certainly 
one  of  the  very  worst  kings  whom  the  British  people  have 
ever  had  the  misfortune  to  call  their  rulers.  He  was  as 
vicious  and  licentious  as  he  was  suspicious,  tyrannical,  and 
cruel ;  but  licentiousness  was,  without  doubt,  his  predomi- 
nant passion,  his  chief  and  ruling  vice.  It  was  deeply- 
rooted  and  ingrained,  it  was  innate,  and  part  and  parcel  of 
his  vicious  nature.  He  had  many  mistresses,  as  well  as 
these  wives,  but  the  names  of  but  few  of  these  have  been 
preserved.  Elizabeth  Tailbois  and  Mary  Boleyn  are  the 
best  known  of  a  legion  of  them,  the  latter  (Mary  Boleyn) 
being  the  elder  sister  of  Anne  Boleyn,  and  the  sensual 
king  immediately  repudiated  her  on  seeing  her  fairer, 
younger,  and  more  beautiful  sister  Anne.''*" 

*  See  'Dictionary  of  (British)  National  Biography,'  vol.  xxvi., 
pp.  76,  82-93  ;  and,  better  still,  Lingard's  *  History  of  England,' 
vol.  vi.,  chap,  i.,  pp.  2,  3,  6;  chap,  ii.,  pp.  121-149;  chap,  iii., 
pp.  150-157,  161-185,  168-295  ;  chaps,  iv.  and  v. 


IMMORALITY.  ir; 

We  pass  on,  and  come  to  James  I.,  who  was  as  immoral 
as  any  of  his  predecessors,  who  encouraged  vice  in  his  court, 
and  was  head  instructor  in  the  school  of  scandal  in  which 
Buckingham  and  Somerset  were  apt  and  foremost  pupils.* 
Yes,  in  the  reign  of  the  '  British  Solomon '  National  immo- 
rahty  flourished  in  Britain  as  it  did  in  the  days  of  Elizabeth 
and  other  sovereigns.  James  II. 's  licentious  passion  for, 
and  his  subsequent  betrayal  of  the  honour  of,  the  Lord 
General  Churchill's  (afterwards  Duke  of  Marlborough)  sister, 
the  ugly  Lady  Arabella,!  were  the  real  causes  of  the  desertion 
of  that  nobleman  (who  was  the  first  soldier  of  his  patron), 
when  the  British  monarch  James  11.  was  in  sore  straits,  and 
his  kingdom  imperilled  on  its  invasion  by  Orange  William 
the  Dutchman.  Had  Churchill  remained  loyal  to  James, 
and  had  not  deserted  him,  we  express  a  doubt  whether  the 
Dutchman  William  of  Orange  would  ever  have  ascended 
the  British  throne ;  but,  as  Churchill  deserted,  and  as  he 
was  James's  right-hand  man  and  first  general,  his  example 
was  contagious.!  James's  forces,  as  the  world  knows,  went 
over  to  William's  side,  and  the  Fourth  of  the  Stuarts  had 
himself  to  flee  the  kingdom,  the  Dutchman  mounting  the 
British  throne  which  he  had  abdicated. 

The  two  First  Georges  were  also  as  dissolute  as  their 
predecessors  ;  for  George  L,  when  he  came  to  mount  the 
British  throne,  brought  in  his  train  a  bevy  of  his  German 
mistresses,  who  were  so  many  burthens  to  the  British  tax- 
payers ;  while  George  II.  was  no  better  than  his  father,  for 
his  lips  were  steeped  in  immorality,  and  he  made  it  his 

"^^  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  ix.,  chap,  iii.,  p.  321  ; 
*  Student's  Hume,'  p.  378. 

t  '  Dictionary  of  (British)  National  Biography,'  vol.  x.,  p.  307. 

X  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  xiv.,  chap,  ii.,  pp.  253, 
254 ;  *  Dictionary  of  (British)  National  Biography,'  vol.  x., 
p.  317  ;  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  xv.,  p.  553. 


ii8  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

business  to  get  as  much  money  as  possible  out  of  the 
British  taxpayers'  pockets  for  his  German  mistresses  to 
squander.* 

Under  every  British  king  who  was  noted  for  his  depravity 
the  court  copied  the  example  of  the  king,  while  the  people 
in  their  turn  followed  the  baneful  and  corrupting  example 
set  them  by  their  superiors — the  king  and  his  court.  The 
last  British  king  and  queen  whose  laxity  of  morals  have 
come  into  unenviable  prominence  and  attained  notoriety 
were  the  dissipated  George  IV.t  and  his  disreputable  queen 
consort,  Caroline  of  Brunswick  ;|  and  these  were  certainly 
more  depraved  than  the  two  First  Georges.  But  the 
British  sovereigns  whom  we  deem  to  have  been  the  most 
dissolute,  depraved,  and  licentious,  were  undoubtedly  the 
Merry  Monarch,  Charles  II.,  and  the  'Virgin'  Queen  Bess. 

We  now  pass  on  to  Charles  II.,  the  Merry  Monarch,  and 
we  must  dwell  at  some  length  on  his  career.  Charles  II.,. 
we  may  safely  say,  was  not  only  the  most  depraved  and 
licentious  British  monarch,  but  his  compeer  or  superior 
in  immorality  amongst  the  European  crowned  heads  has 
never  yet  been  found.  Immorality  has  perhaps  never 
been  more  rife  in  the  United  Kingdom  than  it  was  in 
the  days  of  the  Second  Charles.  Virtue  was  laughed 
to  scorn  by  the  Cavaliers,  while  it  was  the  belief  of  the 
Merry  Monarch  that  every  woman  had  her  price.  Un- 
restrained merriment  ran  wild,  and  indecency,  gross  and 

■'^  May's  *  Constitutional  History,'  vol.  i.,  p.  7 ;  Whitaker's 
'Almanack,'  p.  89;  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica,' vol.  x.  ;  'Dic- 
tionary of  (British)  National  Biography,'  vol.  xxi.,  pp.  146,  I47» 
150,  153-156,  163,164,  170-172. 

f  Morris's  'History  of  England,'  p,  479;  'Dictionary  of 
(British)  National  Biography,'  vol.  ix.,  pp.  151,  152  ;  vol,  xxi.^ 
p.  204. 

t  Ibid. 


IMMORALITY.  ii^ 

unabashed,  reigned  triumphant  in  the  land."**"  The  Pro- 
tector Oliver  and  his  round-headed  Puritans,  bigoted 
and  hypocritical  though  they  were,  sternly  checked  every- 
thing calculated  to  demoralize  the  British  people,  but  when 
the  great  Protector  Oliver  and  his  son  Richard  were  no 
more,  and  dissensions  reigned  in  the  ranks  of  the  divided 
and  leaderless  Cromwellian  army,  and  the  dissolute  Charles 
had  ascended  the  throne  of  his  fathers,  there  came  in  the 
train  of  Charles  and  the  Cavaliers  the  reaction.  For  'under 
the  government  of  men  making  profession  of  godliness,  vice 
had  been  compelled  to  wear  the  exterior  garb  of  virtue  ;  but 
the  moment  the  restraint  was  removed  it  stalked  forth  with- 
out disguise,  and  was  everywhere  received  with  welcome. 
The  Cavaliers,  to  celebrate  their  triumph,  abandoned  them- 
themselves  to  ebriety  and  debauchery ;  and  the  new 
loyalists,  that  they  might  prove  the  sincerity  of  their  con- 
version, strove  to  excel  the  cavaliers  in  licentiousness. 
Charles,  who  had  not  forgotten  his  former  reception  in 
Scotland,  gladly  availed  himself  of  the  opportunity  to 
indulge  his  favourite  propensities.  That  affectation  of  piety 
and  decorum  which  had  marked  the  palace  of  the  Protector 
Oliver  was  soon  exchanged  for  a  perpetual  round  of  pleasure 
and  revelry  ;  and  the  court  of  the  British  king,  if  inferior  in 
splendour,  did  not  yield  in  refinement  and  voluptuousness 
to  that  of  his  French  contemporary,  Louis  XIV.  Among 
the  females  who  sought  to  win  his  attentions  (and  this,  we 
are  told,  was  the  ambition  of  several)  the  first  place,  both 
for  beauty  and  influence,  must  be  allotted  to  Barbara 
Villiers,  daughter  of  Viscount  Grandison,  and  wife  to  a 
gentleman  of  the  name  of  Palmer.  On  the  very  day  of  the 
king's  arrival  in  the  capital  she  established  her  dominion 
over  his  heart  and  contrived  to  retain  it  for  years,  in  defiance 

*  Morris's  'History  of    England,'  pp.  344,  345;    Lingard's 
'  History  of  England— Reign  of  Charles  II.' 


120  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

of  the  inconstancy  of  his  disposition  and  the  intrigues  of  her 
rivals.  With  her  Charles  generally  spent  several  hours  of  the 
day  ;  and  even  when  the  council  had  assembled  to  deliberate 
in  his  presence,  the  truant  monarch  occasionally  preferred 
to  while  away  his  time  in  the  bewitching  company  and  con- 
versation of  his  mistress.'"^  This  Barbara  Villiers,  or  Mrs. 
Palmer,  who  went  by  the  tide  of  Countess  of  Castlemain 
(her  husband,  Palmer,  being  Earl  of  Castlemain),  was  after- 
wards created  Duchess  of  Cleveland  in  her  own  right.  Such 
was  the  licentiousness  and  bare-faced  indecency  prevalent 
at  the  time,  that  though  we  presume  Palmer  was  perfectly 
cognisant  of  his  wife's  infidelity  and  adulterous  intercourse 
with  the  king,  he  took  no  steps  to  hinder  his  wife's 
doings ;  he  did  not  try  to  divorce  her,  but,  instead,  basely 
connived  at  her  conduct,  and  allowed  himself  to  be 
raised  to  the  Earldom  of  Castlemain,  and  to  receive  other 
emoluments,  as  the  price  of  his  wife's  shame.  Lingard, 
writing  on  the  general  depravity  of  the  time  of  the  Second 
Charles,  again  says  :  'The  present  proved  the  most  tranquil 
period  of  the  king's  reign,  but  it  was  disgraced  by  the  ex- 
travagance and  licentiousness  of  the  higher  classes.  The 
gallants  of  the  court  shocked  the  more  sober  of  the  citizens 
by  their  open  contempt  of  the  decencies  of  life,  while 
Charles  laughed  at  their  follies,  and  countenanced  them  by 
example.  At  the  same  time  that  he  renewed  his  visits  and 
attentions  to  the  Duchess  of  Richmond,  he  robbed  the 
theatres  of  two  celebrated  actresses,  known  to  the  public  by 
the  dignified  appellations  of  Moll  Davies  and  Nell  Gwynne. 
Davies  had  attained  eminence  as  a  dancer ;  Gwynne 
attracted  admiration  in  the  character  and  dress  of  a  boy. 
The  former  received  a  splendid  establishment  in  Suffolk 
Street,  and  bore  the  king  a  daughter,  afterwards  married 
into  the  noble  family  of  the  Radclyffes.  The  latter  became 
*  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  xii.,  chap,  ii.,  pp.  76,  yj. 


IMMORALITY.  121 

the  mother  of  the  first  Duke  of  St.  Albans.  Charles  never 
allowed  her  to  interfere  in  matters  of  state,  but  he  appointed 
her  lady  of  the  bedchamber  to  the  queen,  and  assigned  her 
lodgings  in  the  neighbourhood  of  the  court.  She  was  so 
wild,  and  witty,  and  eccentric,  that  he  found  in  her  company 
a  perpetual  source  of  amusement,  a  welcome  relief  from  the 
cares  that  weighed  so  heavily  upon  him  at  times  in  the  sub- 
sequent years  of  his  reign.  Habit,  however,  still  preserved 
to  Castlemain  the  empire  which  she  had  formerly  acquired. 
She  suppressed  all  appearances  of  jealousy,  and  sought  her 
revenge  by  allowing  herself  the  same  liberties  in  which  her 
paramour  indulged. 

"k  ^  ^  ^  *  * 

'  From  the  commencement  to  the  close  of  his  reign  he 
was  the  slave  of  women  ;  but  though  he  tolerated  their 
caprice,  though  he  submitted  to  their  intrigues,  he  was 
neither  jealous  nor  fastidious,  freely  allowing  to  them  that 
latitude  of  indulgence  which  he  claimed  for  himself.  His 
example  in  this  respect  exercised  the  most  pernicious  influ- 
ence on  the  morals  of  the  higher  classes  of  his  subjects. 
His  court  became  a  school  of  vice,  in  which  the  restraints  of 
decency  were  laughed  to  scorn,  and  the  distinctions  which 
he  lavished  on  his  mistresses,  with  the  bold  front  which  he 
enabled  them  to  put  on  their  infamy,  held  out  an  encourage- 
ment to  crime,  and  tended  to  sap  in  youthful  breasts  those 
principles  of  modesty  which  are  the  best  guardians  of  female 
virtue.  There  may  have  been  other  periods  of  our  history 
in  which  immorality  prevailed,  but  none  in  which  it  was 
practised  with  more  ostentation,  or  brought  with  it  less 
disgrace.'* 

Such  was  Charles's  dissoluteness,  such  his  licentiousness, 
that  when  Louis  XIV.  of  France  was  desirous  to  wean  off 

•**•  Lingard's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  xii.,  ch.  iii.,  pp. 
197,  198  ;  vol.  xiii.,  ch.  vii.,  p.  381. 


122  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  Merry  Monarch  from  the  Triple  Alliance,  which  was 
on  the  point  of  completion  by  the  contracting  parties, 
Britain,  Holland  and  Sweden,  the  wily  Sun-King,  knowing 
only  too  well  the  depravity  of  the  British  Charles  and  his 
impressionable  nature  towards  the  fair  sex — for  he  was  the 
slave  of  women  —  sent  over  to  the  British  court  one 
Mademoiselle  de  Querouaille,  better  known  to  the  Britishers 
as  Madame  Carwell — a  woman  as  beautiful  and  witty  as 
she  was  crafty  and  licentious — to  carry  out  his  matured 
plans ;  and  it  is  a  matter  of  common  knowledge  that  his 
sending  over  so  beautiful  and  yet  so  licentious  a  woman 
had  the  desired  effect  on  the  Merry  Monarch.  Charles  was 
captivated  by  her  beauty  and  caught  in  the  snares  of  the 
temptress,  and  Louis,  through  her,  succeeded  only  too  well. 
Madame  Carwell  reigned  triumphant  at  the  British  court, 
Charles  adding  her  to  the  already  large  number  of  his 
mistresses.  He  created  her  Duchess  of  Portsmouth.  She 
was  the  means  of  bringing  about  the  secret  Treaty  of  Dover 
(May  22nd,  1670).  '  Le  Grand  Monarque  '  sent  Charles's 
own  sister,  the  beautiful  and  accomplished,  but  unhappy 
Henrietta,  Duchess  of  Orleans,  to  carry  out  the  terms  of 
-the  alliance,  but  the  way  towards  the  accomplishment  of 
his  scheme  had  been  paved  by  Madame  Carwell.*  The 
clauses  of  the  Treaty  are  matters  of  history.  By  one  of 
them  Charles  undertook  to  publicly  profess  Catholicism  ; 
but  the  shameful  terms  of  the  Treaty  were  that  Charles 
should  assist  Louis  with  the  might  of  his  Three  Kingdoms 
in  the  subjugation  of  Holland,  though  the  British  Ambas- 
sador, Sir  William  Temple,  was  at  the  very  moment  engaged 
(while  Charles  and  his  sister,  the  Duchess  of  Orleans,  were 
arranging  the  preliminaries  of  the  Dover  Treaty)  in  getting 
the   terms  of  the  Triple  Alliance   ratified   by  the    Dutch 

*  Morris's    'History   of    England,'    p.   334,    and   Lingard's 
*  History  of  England.' 


k 


IMMORALITY.  123 


Government.  The  Treaty  of  Dover  further  set  forth  that 
Charles  should  give  his  active  co-operation  and  assist  Louis 
in  his  claims  to  the  Spanish  throne  ;  while  Louis,  on  his 
part,  engaged  to  assist  him  with  6,oco  troops  in  the  event 
of  the  Merry  Monarch  finding  himself  embroiled  in  a  revo- 
lution and  his  throne  in  jeopardy,  and,  what  was  more 
pleasing  to  his  avarice  and  depraved  nature,  gave  him  an 
annual  pension  of  ;^*2oo,ooo,  with  which  the  Merry  Monarch 
was  to  maintain  and  regale  his  legion  of  mistresses. 

The  patient  reader  will  have  observed  that  we  have  more 
or  less  confined  ourselves,  when  dealing  with  British 
immorality  from  the  time  of  William  IIL  to  the  days  of 
George  IV.,  to  the  actions  of  the  different  Sovereigns  and 
their  courts,  and  that  we  have  hardly  insinuated  that  the 
vice  of  immorality  was  national.  But  we  may  say  that  from 
the  depravity  of  each  king  and  his  court  the  reader  can 
form  a  fair  opinion  of  the  morals  of  the  British  people ;  for 
we  take  it  that  what  is  true  for  the  king  and  his  court  also 
holds  true  for  the  great  majority  of  the  people ;  and  this 
was  especially  the  case  in  the  days  of  Charles  IL,  and  of 
the  so-called  'Virgin  Queen  Elizabeth.'  We  know  that  then 
the  manners  of  these  sovereigns  and  of  their  respective, 
courts  were  assiduously  copied  by  their  subjects. 

Immorality  has,  then,  prevailed  to  an  enormous  extent  in 
Britain.  We  now  direct  our  attention  to  France,  to  see 
whether  it  has  not  had  just  as  extensive  and  unenviable  a 
career  in  that  country.  We  mentioned  elsewhere  that 
though  the  French  Henry  II.  had  a  loving  wife  in 
Catherine  de  Medici,  yet  that  did  not  prevent  the  fickle 
monarch  from  indulging  in  the  grossest  way  in  his  favourite 
pleasures,  for  he  had  several  mistresses,  and  many  children 
by  them.  But  the  imperious  woman  who  ruled  the  French 
people,  with  Henry  II.  as  her  medium,  was  his  chief  concu- 
bine, Diana  of  Poitiers,  whom  he  created  Duchess  of  Valen- 


124  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

tinois.  Immorality,  practised  without  any  approach  to 
moderation,  brought  death  prematurely  to  Henry  IV.,  to 
Louis  XII.,  and  to  Louis  XIII.,  all  of  them  depraved  and 
loose  men,  quite  devoid  of  all  proper  moral  principles."^ 

The  Great  Emperor  of  the  West,  Charlemagne  himself 
(Lecky  tells  us  in  his  'History  of  European  Morals'),! 
besides  having  two  wives,  indulged  largely  m  concubines. 
Madame  de  Montespan  was  Louis  XIV. 's  ruling  mistress, 
and  through  Louis  she  indirectly  ruled  France.  In  order 
to  stand  high  in  the  king's  confidence  and  favour,  French 
noblemen  had  to  ingratiate  themselves  with  her.  The 
Fourteenth  Louis  was  certainly  not  as  depraved  as  the 
British  Charles  II.,  but  his  great-grandson  was  the  Merry 
Monarch  of  France,  while  we  are  satisfied  that  the  morals 
of  the  Great  Monarch  were  on  a  par  with  those  of  Elizabeth 
of  England.  Many  mistresses  were  owned  by  Louis  XIV., 
like  the  great  majority  of  the  French  kings  who  went  before 
him. 

Of  all  the  French  rulers,  however,  the  Plfteenth  Louis 
was  certainly  the  most  licentious ;  his  standard  of  immo- 
rality being  a  little  less  shameful  than  that  of  the  Merry 
Monarch,  the  British  Charles  II.  Dubois  and  Duke  Philip 
of  Orleans  were  leading  lights  in  the  school  of  shameless- 
ness  during  Louis  XIV. 's  minority.  When,  shortly  after  the 
king  attained  his  majority,  and  the  Regency  of  Orleans 
terminated,  the  depraved   Dubois  died,  the  companion  of 

■^  '  Encyclopcedia  Britannica,'  vol.  ix.,  and  'English  Cyclo- 
paedia of  Biography.' 

t  Vol.  ii.,  p.  343.  We  would  recommend  for  the  reader's 
perusal  W.  E.  H.  Lecky's  'History  of  European  Morals,'  from 
Augustus  to  Charlemagne,  in  2  vols.  We  think  it  a  pity  that 
Mr.  Lecky  has  not  favoured  the  world  with  another  '  History 
of  European  Morals,'  say  from  Charlemagne  to  George  or 
William  IV. 


I 


IMMORALITY.  125 


his  bosom  in  licentiousness  and  vice,  Philip  of  Orleanp, 
speedily  followed  him  to  the  grave,  he  perishing  through  an 
illness  brought  about  by  his  dissolute  and  intemperate 
habits ;  and  after  the  deaths  of  Dubois  and  Orleans  the 
conduct  of  the  Duke  de  Bourbon,  Louis'  prime  minister, 
and  his  mistress,  the  Marquise  de  Prise,  did  not  conduce  to 
raise  the  standard  of  French  morals  in  the  days  of  Louis  XV. 
Surrounded,  then,  as  he  was,  by  low  and  lack-moral  men 
and  women,  remembering  the  examples  set  him  by  Dubois, 
Orleans,  and,  afterwards,  Bourbon,  adding  to  these  disad- 
vantages his  own  innate  depraved  nature,  it  was  not  to  be 
expected  that  when  he  found  himself  his  own  master  he 
could  have  been  aught  but  a  licentious  man.  He  was 
married,  it  is  true,  to  one  Marie  Leczinski,  but  neither  that 
circumstance  nor  her  piety  in  any  way  tended  to  check  his 
propensity  to  vice ;  they  did  not  prevent  him  from 
plunging  headlong  into  a  career  of  debauchery  and  social 
crimes." 

History  has  preserved  and  transmitted  to  us  the  name 
of  Madame  de  Mailly  as  Louis'  first  mistress,  while  De 
Chateauroux  was  another  well-known  mistress ;  but  it  was 
in  the  person  of  Jeanne  Antoinette  Poisson  le  Normant 
d'Etoiles,  better  known  as  Madame  la  Marquise  de  Pompa- 
dour, that  immorality  played  an  important  part  in  French 
history.  She  was  educated  to  be  a  king's  mistress,  thus 
testifying  to  the  gross  and  universal  licentiousness  existing 
at  the  time.  She,  after  vainly  trying  her  utmost  to  attract 
Louis'  notice,  at  last  succeeded  in  meeting  him  at  a  ball 
given  in  Paris.  She  was  presented  to  the  king,  and  subse- 
quently deserted  her  husband  for  Louis.  In  1745  the 
licentious  and  ambitious  woman  and  unfaithful  wife  became 
the  king's  mistress,  and  had  apartments  fitted  up  for  her  at 

*  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica'  and   'English  Cyclopaedia  of 
Biography.' 


126  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Versailles  near  the  court.  It  was  De  Pompadour  who  ruined 
De  Maurepas,  who  made  Belle-Isle  minister,  and  afterwards 
made  De  Bernis,  her  favourite,  the  king's  minister,  under 
her  guidance.  She  did  more  than  this.  She  allied  herself 
with  Maria  Theresa  of  Austro-Hungary  against  Frederick 
the  Great,  that  alliance  originating  the  Seven  Years'  War. 
She  it  was  who  was  responsible  for  the  loss  of  French  North 
America,  for  the  losses  of  Grenada,  Dominica,  and  Tobago 
to  France,  as  well  as  for  the  disastrous  battles  of  Rosbach, 
Dettingen,  and  Minden,  in  which  the  French  arms  were 
utterly  shattered,  and  their  ranks  demoralized,  by  the 
triumphant  and  conquering  allies  in  the  Seven  Years'  War. 
De  Pompadour  was  the  means  of  introducing  the  Due  de 
Choiseul  to  the  French  premiership,  while  it  was  with  her 
co-operation  that  De  Choiseul  made  the  humiliating  Peace 
of  Paris,  or  Versailles,  for  France.*  When  Louis  XV.'s 
fickle  and  inconstant  disposition  began  to  swerve  from  her, 
his  unscrupulous  and  crafty  mistress,  De  Pompadour,  did 
not  think  it  beneath  her  to  superintend  the  arrangements  of 
the  king's  debaucheries,  and  even  minister  to  his  sensual 
wants  in  her  efforts  to  remain  in  the  favour  of  the  truant 
monarch ;  and  she  succeeded  but  too  well.t  She  it  was  who 
made  Clermont  and  Soubise  commanders-in-chief,  and  at 
the  same  time  it  may  be  said  that  no  man  came  into  office, 
no  man  came  into  prominence  and  the  king's  favour,  save 
through  her  as  intermediary.  She  was,  as  a  consequence, 
courted  and  flattered  by  all  the  depraved  courtiers  and 
others.  I  De  Pompadour,  who  terminated  her  career  in 
1764,  may  be  termed  the  Mrs.  Palmer,  or  Duchess  of 
Cleveland,  of  France,  for  the  Duchess  of  Cleveland  ruled 
Britain  through  Charles  II.  as  long  as  the  Merry  Monarch 

*  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica.'  f  Ibid. 

X  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica'   and  'English   Cyclopaedia  of 
Biography.' 


I 


IMMORALITY.  127 

lived ;  while  the  Marquise  de  Pompadour,  as  long  as  she 
lived,  did  the  same  in  France  through  the  Fifteenth  Louis. 
No  one  came  into  office,  or  was  appointed  to  posts  of  trust, 
save  through  Mrs.  Palmer ;  while  Madame  de  Pompadour 
likewise  was  supreme  in  France,  she  exercising  her  imperious 
sway   over   the   dissolute    Louis,    and,   like   Mrs.    Palmer, 
remaining  in  her  paramour's  favour  up  to  the  last.     After 
De  Pompadour's  death   Louis  XV.   did  not  simply  confine 
himself  to  selecting  the  ladies  of  his  court  as  his  mistresses, 
but  plunged  into  more  degrading  habits,  for  he  sought  out 
vulgar  women  as    well   with  whom  to    satiate  his  sensual 
appetite.      The  infamous  Pare  aux  Cerfs,  where  many  a 
woman  was  ruined,  had  the  licentious  Louis  as  its  originator. 
It  was  arranged  after  the  pattern  of  the  harem  of  the  'Com- 
mander of  the  Faithful.*     Vast  sums  were  squandered  upon 
the  maintenance  of  this  establishment,  which  fairly  scanda- 
lized Europe.     But  it  was  in  1770,  just  six  years  after  the 
death  of   De   Pompadour,  that  the  Archpriestess    of   the  ' 
College  of  Immorality,  the  Pare  aux  Cerfs  Institution,  came 
upon  the  arena,  who  was  none  other  than  Du  Barry.    While 
Marie  Jeanne  Gomard  de  Vaubernier,  afterwards  Countess 
du   Barry,   was  still  in  her  teens  she  was  an  inmate  of  a 
French  brothel,  where  Count  Jean  du  Barry,  a  dissipated 
man  in  a  dissipated  age,  met  her.     He  was  quite  fascinated 
with  her,  and  made  her  his  mistress.     He  introduced  her  to 
the  king's  chamberlain,   and  he  in  turn  presented  her  to 
the  founder  of  the  Pare  aux  Cerfs.* 

When  the  captivated  Louis  wished  to  have  De  Vauber- 
nier— who  was  as  vulgar  as  she  was  beautiful — titled,  in 
order  that  she  might  present  herself  at  Court  as  his  mistress- 
in-chief,  such  was  the  licentiousness  and  barefaced  indecency 
prevalent   at   the   time,   that   Count   Guillaume,   styled  of 

*  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica'  and  'English  Cyclopaedia  of 
Biography.' 


128  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Barry,  brother  to  Mademoiselle  de  Vaubernier's  former 
paramour,  wishing  to  curry  the  favour  of  the  licentious 
Louis,  gladly  and  unhesitatingly  offered  himself  to  supply 
the  title  to  the  mistress  of  the  immoral  monarch,  by  marry- 
ing De  Vaubernier,  which  offer  Louis  accepted.  Du  Barry 
married  De  Vaubernier,  and  she  thus  became  Countess  du 
Barry."'^ 

It  was  in  1770,  we  say,  that  the  Countess  du  Barry  was 
fairly  launched  on  the  sea  of  courdy  life.  She  was  estab- 
lished at  Versailles  as  the  king's  chief  mistress.  Like  De 
Pompadour  who  went  before  her,  Du  Barry  lost  no  time  in 
entering  upon  the  field  of  politics,  and  became  the  willing 
and  pliant  tool  of  the  profligate  courtiers.  She  was  made 
much  of  because  of  the  strong  influence  she  wielded  over 
the  dissipated  Louis.  At  the  instigation  of  the  intriguing 
courtiers  she  drove  the  able  and  talented  De  Choiseul  and 
the  Jansenists  from  office.  Intriguers  and  office-seekers 
who  succeeded  in  pleasing  her  obtained  office  through  her, 
and  became  her  passive  tools.  Du  Barry  made  and  unmade 
ministers,  and  Chancellor  Maupeon,  Marshal  Richelieu, 
and  other  leading  lights  received  their  portfolios  through 
her  as  intermediary ;  while  many  a  French  Parliament  came 
to  grief  because  of  her.  It  was  while  acting  under  her  pro- 
tection that  Maupeon,  the  Chancellor,  dissatisfied  with  its 
proceedings,  terminated  the  career  of  the  then  French 
Parliament  in  1771.+ 

The  profligate  Louis,  who  during  his  whole  lifetime  had 
walked  in  the  ways  of  the  ungodly,  and  was  the  slave  of 
women,  died  in  1774,  an  easy  prey  to  a  fell  disease  which 
he  had  contracted,  after  a  very  long  but  very  inglorious 
reign.     His  grandson  and  successor,  the  Sixteenth  Louis, 

*  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica'    and  'English  Cyclopasdia  of 
Biography.' 
f  'English  Cyclopaedia'  and  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica.' 


IMMORALITY.  129 

was  destined  to  reap  the  bitter  fruits  of  the  evils  the 
Fifteenth  Louis  had  sown.  When  Louis  XV.  died  he  left 
behind  an  impoverished  Treasury  and  an  impoverished 
people ;  but  he  also  left  behind  a  debauched  nobility  and 
bourgeoisie,  who  were  wealthy,  tyrannical,  and  insolent  at 
the  same  time.  When  the  sovereign  People  of  France  rose 
in  rebellion,  they  scattered  to  the  winds  Royalty,  Nobility, 
and  all  other  sorts  of  oppressors,  and  becoming  their  own 
masters,  beheaded  the  Sixteenth  Louis,  who  thus  with  his 
life  expiated  the  sins  of  his  immoral  grandsire,  and  the 
beautiful  Marie  Antoinette,  his  consort,  shared  his  terrible 
fate.  They  did  more.  They  beheaded  most  of  the  nobility ; 
the  guillotine,  herself  a  daughter  of  the  French  Revolution, 
was  kept  busy  at  her  sanguinary  work.  That  guillotine  was 
a  dissatisfied  Moloch,  who  kept  demanding  more  victims. 
Ever  more  it  would  have.  The  all-powerful  and  frenzied 
populace  of  France  sought  out  eligible  victims  for  the  all- 
devouring  Moloch  ;  and  nineteen  years  after  the  demise  of 
the  disreputable  Louis  XV.,  his  mistress,  the  Countess  du 
Barry,  was  pounced  upon  by  the  blood-thirsty  Revolu- 
tionists. Short  work  was  made  in  those  days  of  dealing 
with  the  accused.  To  be  accused  was  virtually  to  be  con- 
demned ;  and  Du  Barry  was  seized  because  she  was  accused  ; 
was  condemned  because  she  was  accused.  In  1793 
Louis  XV.'s  last  mistress-in-chief  perished  at  the  hands  of 
the  Revolution,  a  victim  and  an  expiatory  offering  thrown 
into  the  jaws  of  the  all-devouring  Moloch — guillotine.* 

Immorality  has  been  proved,  then,  to  have  prevailed 
both  in  Britain  and  in  France  to  an  outrageous  extent.  But, 
we  may  ask,  are  these  the  only  two  countries  on  the  Euro- 
pean Continent  in  which  immorality  has  been  thus  rank  ? 
The  truth  is  that  immorality  has  existed  everywhere  on  the 
European  Continent !     W^here,  indeed,  has  it  not  erected  its 

*  '  English  Cyclopaedia  '  and  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica.' 

9 


I30  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

unhallowed  throne  ?  Do  we  turn  to  Russia  and  see  whether 
immorality  has  been  an  active  force  in  that  colossal  country  ? 
Why,  Peter,  the  first  Emperor  of  Russia,  and  the  so-called 
*  father  of  his  country,'  with  all  his  greatness,  led — certainly 
at  the  commencement,  if  not  to  the  end,  of  his  reign — a  life 
of  profligacy;  while  his  queen,  Catherine  (who  afterwards 
reigned  as  Catherine  I.,  Empress  of  Russia),  was  mistress 
to  several  Russian  generals,  the  last  and  best  known  of  whom 
was  the  Prince  Menschikoff.  It  was  in  the  house  of  that  last- 
named  personage  that  the  First  Peter  was  introduced  to 
Catherine,  whom  he  made  his  mistress,  and  then  subse- 
quently married.  The  conduct  of  Elizabeth,  however, 
Peter's  elder  daughter,  threw  that  of  the  Great  Peter  himself 
into  the  shade.  Her  court  was  pregnant  with  vice ;  there 
unbridled  licentiousness  careered  wildly,  while  the  morals 
of  her  nephew  and  successor,  Peter  III.,  were  as  low  as 
those  of  Elizabeth.  The  Third  Peter  compelled  his  wife 
Catherine  (afterwards  Catherine  II.,  Empress  of  Russia)  to 
be  his  confidante  in  his  numerous  shameless  amours  with 
the  Russian  women.  He  forced  her  to  confer  on  his 
principal  mistress,  the  Countess  Woronzoff,  the  distinguished 
Order  of  St.  Catherine.  But  his  wife  and  queen,  Catherine, 
it  is  fair  to  say,  surrounded  as  she  was  by  a  profligate  court, 
equalled  Peter  in  licentiousness  even  during  Peter's  life, 
and  surpassed  all  other  Russian  sovereigns  in  immorality 
after  the  demise  of  Peter.  It  was  with  the  aid  of  the  two 
Orlofls,  her  disreputable  paramours,  that  she  succeeded 
first  in  dethroning  Peter,  then  crowning  her  polluted  brow 
with  the  imperial  diadem  of  the  Czars,  and  at  last  mounting 
the  throne  as  Catherine  II.,  Empress  of  Russia.* 

It  was  during  her  reign  that  Poland  was  completely  par- 
titioned and  disappeared  from   the  rank   of  independent 
states.     For  the  mere  purpose  of  aiding  the  election  of  a 
*  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica.' 


IMMORALITY.  131 

former  lover  of  hers,  Poniatowski,  to  the  kingship  of  Poland, 
Catherine  hurled  a  Russian  horde  in  battle  array  over  the 
Vistula.* 

The  standard  of  Catherine's  morals  was  as  low  as  that  of 
Elizabeth  of  England.  Like  Elizabeth,  she  encouraged 
wholesale  and  systematic  immorality  amongst  the  male  and 
female  courtiers  and  attendants  by  her  example.  Of  course 
the  people  caught  the  infection,  and  copied  the  examples 
set  them  by  their  betters.  Catherine  made  one  favourite 
lover  after  another  minister ;  dismissed  one  to-day  and  set 
up  another  in  his  place  to-morrow  ad  libitum.  Her  most 
trusty  and  favoured,  as  well  as  her  most  crafty  and  un- 
scrupulous, paramour  was  her  minister  Potemkin,  who 
remained  in  office  from  1775  to  1791.  And  he,  when  he 
saw  that  his  mistress's  eager  passion  was  flagging  (as  De 
Pompadour  before,  when  in  a  like  predicament,  artfully  out- 
witted Louis  XV.),  had  recourse  to  the  contrivance  of 
ministering  to  the  sensual  desires  of  the  depraved  Catherine. 
He  got  her  fresh  lovers,  and  he  succeeded  in  retaining 
power  and  office  through  these  creatures  till  his  death. 
The  great  laxity  of  Catherine's  morals  caused  the  paternity 
of  all  her  children  (presumably  by  Peter,  when  that  unhappy 
and  eccentric  monarch  was  alive)  to  be  a  matter  of  grave 
doubt,  the  paternity  of  her  eldest  son,  Paul,  being  treated 
as  a  moot  point,  f 

We  do  not  propose  here  to  enter  into  the  history  of  the 
morals  of  other  European  countries,  because  we  judge  that 
in  dealing,  as  we  have  done,  with  the  morals  of  the  British, 
French,  and  Russians,  all  Europe  has  been  fairly  repre- 
sented. What  makes  Russian  morals  still  worse  to-day  than 
they  were  a  hundred  years  ago  is  the  strange  fact  that  the 
Russian  law  does  not  sanction  divorce. 

Though  the  Caucasian  has  an  immoral  record  in  the  past, 

*  '  En&yclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  v.,  pp.  233-235.      f  Ibid. 

9-2 


132  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

though  he  is  now  wallowing  in  the  mire  of  immorality,  he 
would  fain  take  upon  him  to  lecture  the  African  on  immo- 
rality. 

Did  Clowes,  and  his  unenviable  mentor,  Froude,  and  the 
other  calumniators  of  the  African  race,  when  treating  of 
African  morals,  bethink  themselves  of  the  divorce  case  of 
Scott  V.  Scott  and  the  Honourable  Charles  Lowther,  which 
was  heard  in  November,  1882;  of  the  divorce  case  of  the 
Honourable  Wyndham  Edward  Campbell  Stanhope  v.  the 
Honourable  Mrs.  Camille  Caroline  Stanhope  and  Adye, 
which  was  heard  in  May,  1883  ;  of  the  divorce  petition  of 
Sir  Francis  MacNaghten  v.  Lady  MacNaghten  and  Thorn- 
hill,  which  was  tried  in  February,  1883  ;  of  the  divorce 
petition  of  the  Lady  St.  Leonards  v.  the  Right  Honourable 
Lord  St.  Leonards  and  another,  which  was  tried  in  February, 
1883;  of  the  divorce  petition  of  his  Grace  the  Duke  of 
Marlborough  v.  Her  Grace  the  Duchess  of  Marlborough  and 
another,  which  was  tried  in  1883 ;  of  the  divorce  petition  of 
the  Baron  Henry  de  Worms  v.  the  Baroness  Fanny  de 
Worms  and  the  Baron  Moritz  von  Leon,   tried  in   July, 

1886  ;  of  the  divorce  petition  of  the  Lord  Colin  Campbell 
V.  Lady  Colin  Campbell,  His  Grace  the  Duke  of  Marl- 
borough, Shaw,  Butter,  and  Bird,  tried  in  July,  1886;  of 
the  cross-petition  for  divorce  of  the  Lady  Colin  Campbell 
V.  Lord  Colin  Campbell  and  another,  which  was  also  tried 
in  July,  1886;  of  the  Most  Honourable  the  Marchioness  of 
Queensberry  v.  the  Most  Honourable  the  Marquis  of 
Queensberry  and   another,    which   was   tried   in   January, 

1887  ?  Do  the  calumniators  of  the  African  race,  when  ex- 
patiating on  the  morals  of  the  African  to  his  detriment,  also 
bethink  themselves  of  the  divorce  petition  of  Crawford  v. 
Crawford  and  the  Right  Honourable  Sir  Charles  Dilke, 
Bart,  which  was  tried  in  January,  1886;  of  the  divorce 
petition  of  the  Right  Honourable  Lady  Connemara  v.  the 


IMMORALITY.  133 

Right  Honourable  Lord  Connemara,  G.C.I.E.,  ex-Governor- 
General  of  Madras,  and  Hannah  Moore,  which  was  tried  in 
July,  1890? 

With  between  1,500  and  1,600  divorce  petitions,  almost 
everyone  based  on  moral  unfaithfulness,  which  are  annually 
heard  in  the  United  Kingdom,  and  in  which  not  only  noble 
lords  and  ladies,  members  of  Government,  members  of 
Parliament,  governors,  baronets,  knights,  and  honourables, 
but  also  parsons,  figure  as  respondents  and  co-respondents, 
can  the  Britisher  dare  to  deny  that  immorality  prevails,  to 
an  enormous  extent,  in  his  country  1  With  the  immoral 
offences  committed  under  the  Criminal  Law  Amend- 
ment Act,  for  which  one  member  of  Parliament,  the  late 
member  for  North  Bucks,  has  been  sentenced  to  twelve 
months'  imprisonment,  and  for  which  another  member,  the 
member  for  East  Belfast,*  is  living  in  ignoble  exile,  on 
the  European  mainland,  can  the  Britisher  dare  to  deny 
that  immorality  prevails,  to  an  alarming  extent,  in  his 
country  1  With  the  bold  front  which  immorality  puts  on 
as  it  stalks  abroad,  and  greets  them  in  the  streets  at  every 
turn,  not  only  in  the  small  hours  of  the  morning,  but  in  the 
broad  glare  of  daylight,  and  in  the  Cimmerian  darkness  of 
murky  night,  can  the  Britisher  dare  to  deny  that  immorality 
prevails,  to  the  rankest  extent,  in  his  country'^ 

Yet,  with  their  standard  of  immorality  at  such  a  high 
and  unenviable  pitch,  the  Caucasians  —  particularly  the 
Britishers,  Frenchmen,  or  Americans — would  fain  lecture, 
on  the  Sixth  and  Ninth  Commandments,  those  Africans 
who  are  certainly  a  great  deal  less  unclean  than  them- 
selves ! 

Immorality  has  also  been  found  the  practice  of  great 
men,  great  national  heroes  \  for  even  the  immortal  Lord 
Viscount  Nelson,  the  hero  of  Trafalgar,  the  Nile,  and  many 
*  Since  expelled  from  Parliament. 


134  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

other  battles,  and  the  great  Robert  Burns,  the  Scottish  poet^ 
have  gone  down  before  the  power  of  this  evil,  and  have 
been  found  worshipping  at  this  unhallowed  shrine.  It  was 
the  Lady  Emma  Hamilton,  sometime  mistress  to  Captain 
John  Willet  Payne,  afterwards  mistress  to  Sir  Harry 
Fetherstonhaugh  ;  afterwards  mistress  to  the  Honourable 
Charles  Greville  ;  then  mistress  to,  and  afterwards  the 
faithless  wife  of.  Sir  William  Hamilton,  once  British  Envoy 
to  the  Neapolitan  Court, "'^  who  caused  her  paramour,  the 
great  Lord  Nelson,  to  refuse  to  recognise  the  Neapolitan 
treaty  of  Uovo-Nuovo,  concluded  between  Cardinal  Ruffo- 
and  the  insurgent  Prince  Francesco-Caraccioli ;  and  it  was 
this  Lady  Emma  Hamilton  who  urged  her  lover  Nelson  to 
have  her  enemy  Caraccioli  tried  by  court-martial,  with  his 
(the  Prince's)  personal  enemy,  Count  Thurn,  as  president. 
Then  Caraccioli  was  condemned  to  death.  Though  the 
unfortunate  Prince  petitioned  for  a  second,  but  a  fair,  trial 
or  for  a  free  pardon  ;  though  he  petitioned  that  should 
neither  of  these  be  granted,  it  was  his  desire  to  die  a 
soldier's  death  by  being  shot ;  and  though  he  was  verging 
toward  three-score  and  ten,  the  Neapolitan  authorities  re- 
fused all  his  requests,  and  resolved  to  carry  out  his  death- 
sentence  by  hanging,  by  his  being  drawn  and  quartered, 
and  by  finally  throwing  his  body  into  the  sea,  with  a  shot 
of  250  pounds'  weight  tied  to  their  victim's  legs.  The 
preliminary  proceedings  and  trial  were  unlawful ;  the  sub- 
sequent condemnation  was  unjust ;  and  the  final  act,  the 
hanging,  was  not  an  execution  but  a  judicial  murder.  And 
for  these  the  Lord  Viscount  Nelson  and  the  Lady  Emma 
Hamilton  were  responsible.! 
It  is  acts  like  these  which  are  a  sad  blot  on  the  great 

*  British  'Dictionary  of  National  Biography,'  vol.  xxiv.,  pp. 
148,  149- 
f  Southey's  '  Life  of  Nelson/  vol.  ii. 


IMMORALITY.  135 

Nelson's  reputation,  and  all  these  were  brought  about 
because  of  his  unhallowed  passion  for  this  Lady  Emma 
Hamilton,  the  wife  of  his  friend,  who  urged  Nelson  on  to 
the  doing  of  them.* 

Was  not  the  great  Robert  Burns  one  of  the  most  illus- 
trious of  British  poets  ?  does  not  he  yield  the  palm,  in  the 
poetical  arts,  only  to  Sir  Walter  Scott  among  the  poets  of 
Caledonia?  And  was  not  he  a  keen  worshipper  at  the 
shrine  of  Asmodeus  ?  And  did  he  not  sing  the  praises  of, 
and  address  odes  to,  his  Clarinda,  and  other  mistresses?! 
George  Noel  Gordon,  sixth  Lord  Byron,  certainly  a  very 
celebrated  British  poet,  was,  as  the  world  knows,  a  very 
immoral  man.  | 

Caucasians  therefore,  having  an  immoral  past  and  an 
immoral  present,  are  not  authorized  to  moralize  over  the 
Africans,  because  they  are  to  some  extent  polluted  and 
unclean. 

Mr.  Clowes,  Mr.  Froude,  and  others,  are  all  acquainted 
with  the  good  old  adage,  *  Charity  begins  at  home.'  Why 
do  not  they  then,  instead  of  moralizing  over  the  African, 
moralize  over  their  own  far  more  degraded  countrymen, 
these  Honourables,  these  Knights,  these  Baronets,  these 
Members  of  Parliaments,  these  Members  of  Government, 
these   Governors,   these    Dukes,   these    Marquises,    these 

*  Southey's  'Life  of  Nelson,'  vol.  ii.  Also  'Encyclopaedia 
Britannica,'  vol.  xvii.,  p.  323;  vol.  xi.,  p.  421. 

t  "  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  iv.,  pp.  568-570 ;  '  Dic- 
tionary of  National  Biography,'  vol.  vii.,  pp.  427-434,  436. 

X  Macaulay's  '  Essay  on  Moore's  Life  of  Lord  Byron,'  pp. 
143,  144  et  seq.;  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  iv.,  pp.  606- 
610;  'Dictionary  of  National  Biography,'  vol.  viii.,  pp.  139, 
140,  142-150,  153  ;  Mrs.  H.  E.  Beecher  Stowe  in  Macmillaris 
Magazine  and  the  Atlantic  Monthly  for  September,  1869,  and 
'Lady  Byron  Vindicated  ;  a  History  of  the  Byron  Controversy, 
1870. 


136  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

other  lords,  these  parsons,  who  figure  as  respondents 
or  co-respondents  in  divorce  petitions  in  the  Divorce 
Courts?  If  there  was  no  immorality  there  would  be 
no  divorce  petitions,  and  no  need  of  Divorce  Courts. 
Whatever  holds  good  for  the  British  people  on  the  score  of 
immorality,  likewise  holds  true  for  the  American  white 
people.  We  are,  indeed,  convinced  that  the  white 
Americans  are  more  immoral  than  their  British  cousins. 
To  quote  a  contributor  to  Blackwood^ s  Magazine  for 
May,  1 89 1,  'Such  heinous  crimes,  as  brought  destruction 
upon  Sodom  and  Gomorrah,  indescribable  and  awful 
outrages  upon  women  and  girls,'  are  daily  perpetrated 
in  the  United  States  of  North  America  by  the  white 
Americans. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

SUPERSTITION    IN    THE   NINETEENTH    CENTURY. 

Wherever  there  is  gross  ignorance,  there  superstition  will 
be  found.-  It  has  its  seat  in  the  region  of  ignorance,  and 
exists  in  countries  uncivilized  and  semi-civilized,  though  to 
some  extent  also  in  countries  civilized. 

When  the  '  suttee '  immolated  herself  on  the  funeral- 
pyre  of  her  husband,  in  half-civilized  Hindostan,  in  the 
hope,  and  with  the  belief,  that  the  doing  of  that  act  would 
secure  her  salvation  and  eternal  happiness,  as  well  as  wash 
away  the  possible  sins  both  of  her  husband  and  of  his 
ancestors,  securing  their  admittance  into  the  kingdom  of 
everlasting  glory,  we  recognise  superstition.  When  witches 
were  burnt  to  death  throughout  the  world,  in  bygone  cen- 
turies, the  then  rulers  who  condemned  them  were  '  super- 
stitious.' James  I.,  the  *  British  Solomon,'  wrote  his 
*  Demonology,'  a  book  bearing  on  witchcraft,  in  which  he 
ascribed  the  raising  of  storms  and  unpleasant  winds,  fell 
diseases,  and  other  evils  to  the  witches;  and  the  super- 
stitious British  Solomon  went  in  great  fear  of  them.  So 
great  a  hold  had  '  superstition '  on  the  minds  of  Britishers, 
in  the  days  of  the  British  Solomon,  that  the  statute  i  Jac.  I., 
cap.  12,  was  easily  passed  against  witches,  or  sorceresses, 
and  their  abettors.  And  that  foolish  and  infamous  statute 
was  not  repealed  till  the  reign  of  George  II.      The  laws 


138  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

bearing  on  witches,  and  their  abettors,  are   set  forth   in 
sections  2  and  3  of  the  statute   i  Jac.  I.,  cap.  12.     In  the 
words  of  a  learned  historian :  '  With  great  parade  of  learn- 
ing, he'  (James  I.)  '  demonstrated  the  existence  of  witches, 
and  the  mischiefs  of  witchcraft,  against  the  objections  of 
Scot  and  Wierns;  he  even  discovered  a  satisfactory  solution 
of  that  obscure  but  interesting  question,  "  Why  the  devil 
did  worke  more  with  auncient  women  than  others."     But 
ancient  women  had  no  reason  to  congratulate  themselves 
on  the  sagacity  of  their  sovereign.     Witchcraft  at  his  solici- 
tation was  made  a  capital  offence ;  and  from  the  commence- 
ment of  his  reign  there  scarcely  passed  a  year  in  which  some 
aged  female  or  other  was  not  condemned  to  expiate  on  the 
gallows  her  imaginary  communications  with  the  evil  spirit' 
The  Asiatic  fakir,  who  practises  severe  austerities,  and 
either  condemns  himself  to  a  standing  posture  all  the  days 
of  his  life,  with  a  stick  under  his  armpits  to  support  him,  or 
lacerates  his  body  with  knives  or  with  scourges,  is  deemed 
'  superstitious '  by  all  Christians.     The  man  who  wears  an 
amulet  as  a  charm  and  preventive  against  diseases,  mis- 
chiefs, and  other  evils,  appended  to  his  neck  or  attached  to 
his  waist,  is  'superstitious,' though  that  superstitious  custom 
is  common  to  most  of  the  countries  of  Asia,  and  especially 
where  Mahommedanism  prevails.     The  same  custom,  how- 
ever, is  to  be  met  with  even  amongst  Europeans  and  those 
of  European  descent,  the  Spaniards,  and  Spanish  Americans, 
the  Portuguese  and  Brazilians  more  particularly.     Those 
Englishmen   who   ascribed    the   cause   of   the    loathsome 
eruptions,  which  appeared  on  the  face  of  the  Bolingbroke 
Henry,  to  his  execution  of  Archbishop  Scrope  of  York, 
could  not  have  been  other  than  *  superstitious ' ;  while  the 
old  custom  of  touching  for  the  King's-evil,  which  originated 
with  the  Confessor  and  sank  into  desuetude  in  the  days 
when  Anne  was  queen,  may  truly  be  termed  'superstitious/ 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.    139 

But  it  was  in  ancient  times  that  superstition  played  its  most 
important  part,  when  heathenism  was  most  rife.  Then 
men  and  women  and  children  were  butchered  in  the  most 
barbarous  manner,  and  sacrificed  as  victims  to  appease 
the  anger  or  gratify  the  whim  of  a  jumble  of  gods.  In 
those  times  there  was  a  universal  belief  in  omens ;  and  we 
know  that  when  the  great  Julius,  on  landing  in  Africa,  in 
his  march  against  Cato  Uticensis  and  the  Numidian  Juba, 
suddenly  fell  down,  that  incident  was  deemed  an  unlucky  omen 
by  his  Romans,  who  were  seized  with  consternation,  which 
when  the  first  and  greatest  of  the  Romans  saw,  he  not  only 
dispelled,  but  turned  to  his  advantage,  by  wisely  exclaiming, 
'  It  is  now,  O  Africa,  that  I  take  possession  of  thee  !'  A 
superstitious  custom,  which  prevented  the  German  Ario- 
vistus  (whose  very  name  exercised  unwholesome  dread 
amongst  the  ranks  of  Caesar's  Romans)  from  fighting  before 
the  advent  of  the  new  moon,  as  Caesar  tells  us  in  his  first 
book  of  the  Commentaries  on  the  Gallic  War,  enabled  that 
renowned  general  with  the  greater  facility  to  shatter  the 
German  arms  of  Ariovistus.  It  was  a  superstitious  custom, 
hundreds  of  years  before  the  birth  of  the  great  Julius,  which 
caused  the  stern  and  fighting  Spartans  to  refuse  to  help  the 
Athenians  against  the  Persians  at  Marathon  before  the 
advent  of  the  full  moon.  Superstition  is  gradually  dis- 
appearing from  the  modern  world  with  the  advance  ot 
civilization,  but  it  will  be  a  long  time  yet  before  it  finally 
disappears  ;  for  a  belief  in  ghosts  still  exists  even  in  the 
civilized  world  as  it  has  existed  in  bygone  ages. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  witchcraft,  alchemy,  and  astrology 
were  universally  believed  in,  just  as  there  can  be  found  men 
even  in  our  own  times,  even  in  this  nineteenth  century, 
who  implicitly  believe  in  such  things.  Men  who  thirsted 
after  knowledge,  and  excelled  their  countrymen  in  scholarly 
attainments,  in  the  middle  and  earlier  ages,  were  looked 


I40  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

upon  with  awe,  and  had  the  notoriety  of  being  leagued  in 
secret  compact  with  the  Arch-enemy  of  mankind,  who  sup- 
plied them  with  the  desired  knowledge  at  the  price  of  their 
souls,  given  over  to  him  when  they  paid  the  debt  of  nature. 
Witchcraft  was  believed  in,  even  by  eminent  men  in  Britain 
and  other  countries,  in  the  days  of  Elizabeth  and  James  I. 
And  these  sovereigns  believed  in  it,  as  did  also  Louis  XV. 
and  others,  but  that  belief  is  mostly  confined  to-day  to  the 
more  ignorant  classes  of  the  people. 

In  the  olden  days  old  women  were  generally,  but  not 
exclusively,  the  victims  of  the  absurd  and  superstitious 
belief  in  witchcraft.  Even  young  girls  were  either  hung, 
drowned,  or  perished  by  fire ;  because  we  know  that  when 
Joan  of  Arc  appeared  before  the  gates  of  Orleans,  at  the 
head  of  the  French  soldiery,  so  great  and  widespread  was 
the  superstition  in  the  ranks  of  the  demoralized  British 
soldiers  that,  panic-stricken,  they  raised  the  siege  without 
even  striking  a  blow.  And  when  they  got  her  into  their  power, 
in  the  year  following  their  disgrace,  after  subjecting  her  to  a 
year's  imprisonment,  the  superstitious  English  wreaked  their 
vengeance  on  the  young  '  Maid  of  Orleans '  by  burning  her 
at  the  stake,  on  the  groundless  charge  that  she  was  a  witch, 
in  league  with  Satan. "^ 

Elizabeth,  like  most  of  her  predecessors  and  successors, 
James  I.  foremost  amongst  these  latter,  was  superstitious; 
she  put  implicit  faith,  we  are  told,  in  the  utterances  of  the 
astrologers  whom  she  consulted.  The  Hindoo  devotee 
who,  even  in  this  nineteenth  century  of  our  era,  takes  an 
annual  plunge  in  the  Hooghly,  in  the  hope  that  his  act 
will  wash  away  and  purge  him  from  his  sins,  and  secure 
for  him    and  for  his    descendants,  down  to  the  fourth  or 

*  Morris's  '  History  of  England,'  p.  263.  There  is  good 
reason,  however,  for  thinking  this  account  of  the  Maid  of 
Orleans  is  legendary,  not  historical. 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.     141 

ifth  generation,  salvation  and  unending  happiness  in  the 
next  world,  and  who  also  believes  that  his  plunge  will 
cleanse  the  souls  of  his  ancestors,  and  enable  them  to 
receive  the  glorious  beatitude  of  the  hereafter,  is  surely 
'superstitious.'  All  Christians  regard  those  Indians  as 
superstitious  who  look  upon  the  Ganges  as  a  sacred  river; 
just  as  they  also  apply  the  term  '  superstition '  to  the  fast 
from  sunrise  to  sunset,  and  the  ridiculously  mysterious 
rites,  performed  by  the  fanatical  Mahommedan  Indians  at 
their  Mahradan,  or  Hosein  festival,  during  which  goats  are 
sacrificed.  But  while  the  term  '  superstitious '  may  safely 
be  applied  to  the  Hindoo  worshippers  of  Brahma,  Vishnu, 
and  Siva,  we  may  also  apply  the  term  to  the  veneration 
paid  by  the  Asiatic  Indians  to  the  cow  and  the  goat. 

The  excessive  reverence  and  divine  honour  paid  to  the 
Brahmin  priests  by  the  Hindoos  are  by  us  Christians  held 
to  be  superstitious  and  an  absurdity.  We  ridicule,  or  at 
least  make  light  of,  the  Indian  custom  of  child-marriage, 
and  the  law  against  the  re-marriage  of  widows.  The 
British,  unlike  the  French,  being  in  the  habit  of  interfering 
with  the  customs  of  their  subjects,  abolished  the  supersti- 
tious suttee-custom,  in  1829,  when  Lord  William  Bentinck 
was  Governor-General  of  India.  But  that  legislation  was 
accomplished  only  after  a  great  struggle  on  the  part  of  the 
Hindoos,  who  agitated  and  declaimed  against  what  they 
termed  the  profane  act  of  the  Britishers.  We  say  that  the 
suttee  was  certainly  a  custom  worth  putting  a  stop  to,  and 
we  hold  the  British  fully  justified  in  removing  one  of  the 
many  relics  of  Indian  barbarism.  Nevertheless,  it  is  a  fact 
that  the  British  do  not  sufficiently  respect  the  scruples  of 
their  subjects.  It  is  otherwise  with  the  French.  But  we 
are  quite  prepared  to  admit  that  the  suttee-custom  would, 
in  all  probability,  have  been  put  down  by  the  French  if 
they  had  been  in  possession  of  the  peninsula  of  Hindostan. 


142  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

The  fact  that  the  British  made  light  of  the  rehgious 
scruples  of  their  Indian  Sepoys  is  supposed  to  have  caused 
the  famous  Indian  Mutiny  of  1857-58.  When,  in  1856, 
Lord  Palmerston's  Government  resolved  to  introduce  the 
Minie  rifle,  which  necessitated  the  use  of  greased  cartridges 
among  the  Indian  Sepoys,  as  they  have  done  with  such 
good  result  among  the  British  army,  both  at  home  and 
elsewhere  abroad,  these  Sepoys  murmured,  because  they 
suspected  and  feared  that  the  grease  of  the  cartridge 
which  was  used  for  the  Minie  rifle  was  made  of  the  fat  of 
ox  and  pig.  Now,  the  British  Government,  although  they 
know  right  well  that  the  Hindoo  held  ox-fat  in  the  greatest 
abhorrence,  because  he  believed  that  he  would  lose  caste  if  he 
were  to  touch  it,  though  they  also  knew  that  the  Mahom- 
medan  equally  abhorred  the  fat  of  the  pig,  holding  the 
swine,  after  the  fashion  of  the  Jews,  as  an  unclean  animal, 
yet  did  not  respect  their  scruples,  nor  did  they  take  any 
precaution  against  exasperating  the  Sepoys,  and  driving 
them  into  active  mutiny.  They  (the  British  Government) 
failed  to  allay  the  storm  which  they  had  conjured  up,  for 
the  Indian  Sepoys,  from  deep  murmurings,  burst  into  the 
now  historical  open  Mutiny,  which  lasted  twelve  months, 
terminating  only  after  thousands  of  lives  had  been  lost  and 
millions  of  money  had  been  spent.  Though  the  British 
Government  were  greatly  to  blame,  yet  we  cannot  help 
ascribing  the  Indian  Mutiny  to  the  superstition  of  the 
Sepoys,  for  their  objection  to  the  use  of  the  greased  car- 
tridge, on  the  ground  that  it  was  made  of  the  fat  of  ox 
and  pig,  could  be  nothing  but  superstition. 

Those  Hindoos,  and  particularly  the  Brahmins,  who 
never  leave  India,  on  the  ground  that  they  would  lose 
caste  were  they  to  do  so,  are  by  us  deemed  to  be  super- 
stitious ;  while  the  same  Hindoos,  like  their  forefathers 
before  them,  only  eat  mutton  of  animal  food,  the  Mahom- 


IV  567 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  143 

medan  doing  the  reverse,  for  he  eats  everything  in  the 
shape  of  animal  food,  mutton  and  pork  being  barred ; 
while  we  Christians,  who  eat  everything  in  the  shape  of 
animal  food,  deem  both  Hindoos  and  Mahommedans 
superstitious — the  one  for  eating  one  thing  and  rejecting  all 
others,  the  other  for  eating  everything  but  mutton  and  pork. 
But  it  is  not  only  the  Asiatic  who  is  superstitious,  for  the 
Malay  is  also  superstitious;  while  the  American,  or  Red 
Indian,  who  believes  in  the  Manitow,  and  takes  delight  in 
ghost-dancing,  is  also  superstitious.  The  Caucasians,  who 
pose  as  civilizers,  are  themselves  also  superstitious ;  that  it 
is  our  business  to  prove ;  and  that  we  propose  to  do  in  the 
current  pages. 

Superstition  exists  in  Europe  to-day  as  it  did  in  the  days 
of  the  dead  past. 

The  Balkan  peasant  of  the  Greek  Orthodox  Faith,  who 
rubs  himself  all  over  with  garlic  during  Holy  or  Passion 
Week,  and  other  Fast-days,  in  the  hope  of  keeping  His 
Satanic  Majesty  at  a  distance,  and,  according  to  the 
peasant's  belief,  so  that  he  may  not  have  a  chance  of 
tempting  him  to  swerve  from  the  right  path  and  commit 
mischief,  must  be  called  superstitious. 

The  Britishers  who  consult  Gipsy  fortune-tellers  as  to 
their  prospects,  and  allow  themselves  to  be  defrauded  of 
their  money,  are  surely  superstitious.  And  those  French- 
men and  Germans,  those  Italians  and  Spaniards,  who  allow 
themselves  to  be  inveigled  and  swindled  of  their  last  penny 
by  the  cunning  fortune-telling  Bohemians,  Zigeuner,  Zingari, 
or  Gitanos,  are  also  superstitious. 

We  call  that  person  superstitious  (not  to  say  a  hypocrite) 
who  commits  crimes  in  the  course  of  his  life,  and  yet  prac- 
tises rigid  and  excessive  austerities  ;  who  will  not  work  a 
horse  on  a  Sunday,  and  objects  to  train,  tram,  omnibus, 
and  carriage  being  used  on  a  Sunday.     Just  as  we  term 


144  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  women  superstitious  who  will  not  thread  a  needle  and 
do  a  little  sewing,  or  other  harmless  things,  for  her  hus- 
band or  brother,  on  a  Sunday,  and  objects  to  every  sort  of 
Music,  save  Sacred  Music,  on  a  Sunday.  The  Britisher 
to-day  is,  in  some  respects,  as  superstitious  as  his  forefathers 
were  before  him  in  the  buried  past. 

Wright,  writing  in  1852,  tells  us  that  there  is  a  circle  of 
stones  in  the  county  of  Cornwall  called  the  *  Dance  Maine,^ 
or  the  dance  of  stones,  which  the  Cornish  peasantry  allege 
is  a  representation  of  a  party  of  young  damsels  who,  they 
said,  were  turned  into  stones  because  they  happened  to 
dance  on  the  Sabbath.  That  circle  of  stones  is  therefore 
regarded  by  the  Cornish  peasantry  with  superstitious  fear 
and  reverence  commingled.  Wright  also  tells  us  that  the 
superstitious  Oxonian  peasant,  with  charming  simplicity 
and  stolid  belief,  gravely  avers  that  the  party  of  soldiers 
who  came  to  destroy  Long  Compton  were  changed  into 
the  Rollrich  stones  in  Oxfordshire. ■*" 

Wright  testifies  to  British  superstition  in  1852,  it  is  true, 
but  it  is  nevertheless  true  that  it  is  in  this  nineteenth  cen- 
tury that  he  writes ;  and  we  believe  that  the  same  super- 
stition exists  (in  1891)  both  in  Cornwall  and  in  Oxfordshire 
as  it  did  in  1852,  the  year  in  which  Wright  wrote  his  book. 
It  may  truly  be  said  that  superstition  exists  to  just  as  great 
an  extent  amongst  Britishers  as  it  does  amongst  other 
Caucasians.  The  British  Lowen  Pike,  writing  in  1876, 
that  is,  fifteen  years  ago,  and  twenty-four  years  after  Wright, 
expresses  the  hope  that  the  'half-believers  in  witchcraft 
who  are  still  amongst  us  (Britishers)  may  dwindle  in 
numbers  generation  after  generation.'! 

*  Wright's  '  The  Celt,  the  Roman,  and  the  Saxon,'  chap  ii., 
p.  62. 

t  Lowen  Pike's  '  History  of  Crime  in  England,'  vol.  ii.,  chap. 
xiii.,  p.  592. 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY,    145 

Sir  Walter  Scott,  one  of  the  greatest  of  British  bards,  and 
Caledonia's  first  poet,  testifies  to  the  superstition  of  the  age 
in  which  he  lived — and  he  flourished  in  the  eighteenth  and 
in  the  earlier  part  of  the  nineteenth  centuries,  that  is  to 
say,  from  1771  to  i832^and  particularly  to  the  super- 
stition prevalent  amongst  his  British  countrymen  of  those 
days,  by  writing  his  '  Letters  on  Demonology  and  Witch- 
craft' 

Because  Robert  Burns  saw  how  superstitious  his  Scottish 
fellow-countrymen — his  *  brither  Scots  ' — were  in  his  life- 
time (and  Burns  flourished  from  1759  to  1796),  he  immor- 
talized superstition  in  his  'Address  to  the  Deil,'  and  in 
'  The  Deil's  awa'  wi'  th'  Exciseman.'  And  does  not  the 
English  Samuel  Rogers,  who  lived  from  1763  to  1855,  for 
a  like  reason  immortalize  it  by  addressing  an  *  Ode  to 
Superstition,'  thereby  reflecting  on  the  crude  notions  and 
absurd  beliefs  of  the  Englishmen  of  his  day? 

The  celebrated  but  eccentric  novelist,  Charles  Dickens, 
who  flourished  from  18 12  to  1870,  also  testifies  to  the 
superstition  of  Britishers  by  writing  his  '  Wonderful  Ghost 
Story.' 

Hanovero-German  George  II.  of  Great  Britain  and 
Ireland,  like  many  of  those  who  went  before  him,  're- 
mained to  the  day  of  his  death  an  implicit  believer  in  ...  . 
ghosts,  witches  and  vampires.'*  And  the  British  Macaulay, 
in  his  '  Essay  on  Ranke's  History  of  the  Popes,'  assures  us 
that  Samuel  Johnson,  'incredulous  on  all  other  points,  was 
a  ready  believer  in  apparitions.  He  would  not  believe  in 
Ossian ;  but  he  was  willing  to  believe  in  the  second  sight. 
He  would  not  believe  in  the  earthquake  of  Lisbon  ;  but  he 
was  willing  to  believe  in  the  Cock  Lane  ghost.' t 

The   Caucasian,    who   to-day  btlieves   in   the   so-called 

*  'Dictionary  of  National  Biography,'  vol.  xxi.,  p.  171. 
t  *  Macaulay's  Essays,'  p.  551. 

10 


146  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

'  evil-eye,'  and  its  imaginary  harmful  powers,  is  decidedly 
superstitious ;  and  there  are  very  many  Caucasians  who 
labour  under  that  delusion.  The  belief  in  the  '  evil-eye ' 
is  as  rife  to-day  as  it  was  in  the  days  of  yore. 

When  the  British  landlady  absolutely  refuses  to  allow  her 
bed,  or  the  beds  of  her  lodgers,  to  be  turned  over  on  Sun- 
days, under  the  absurd  belief  that  mischief  and  disaster, 
grim  and  terrible,  will  befall  her,  and  her  kith  and  kin,  if 
that  act  be  done  on  the  Lord's  Day,  she  is  a  superstitious 
woman  ;  and  we  also  apply  the  term  '  superstitious '  to  the 
British  burglar,  who  arms  himself  with  some  mystic  and 
questionable  talisman,  in  the  hope  that  it  may  serve  as  a 
charm  against  his  being  caught,  red-handed,  whilst  bur- 
glariously storming  and  looting  some  wealthy  mansion. 

The  belief  in  the  banshee,  or  fairy,  which  ignorant  Irish- 
men suppose  attaches  itself  to  a  particular  house,  and 
presents  itself  to  view  at  the  approaching  death  of  one  of 
the  inmates  of  that  house,  is  gross  superstition ;  while  the 
canny  Highland  crofters,  and  other  Highland  men  of 
Caledonia,  '  stern  and  wild,'  who  believe  in  the  second 
sight,  and,  like  the  ignorant  Irishman,  believe  that  an  elf 
or  fairy  attaches  itself  to  a  certain  house,  and  shows  itself 
at  the  impending  death  of  one  of  the  members  of  that 
family,  are  superstitious. 

More.  There  are  Highlanders  to-day  who  believe  that, 
if  the  presentation  of  a  tuft  of  the  brown  heather  to  their 
guest  on  his  immediate  appearance  at  their  threshold  be 
omitted,  ill-luck  and  mischief  will  follow  that  omission  and 
short-coming,  while  these  same  canny  Highlanders  have  the 
belief  that  their  aged  relatives — the  female  ones  in  a  greater 
degree — possess  the  gift  of  prophecy. 

We  say  that  all  these  superstitions,  as  above  detailed, 
do  exist  nowadays  in  the  United  Kingdom  of  Great  Britain 
and  Ireland,  and  in  other  parts  of  the  Caucasian  world. 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  147 

We  have  shown  that  superstition  existed  amongst  Cau- 
casians in  the  days  of  Burns,  Scott,  Rogers,  Wright,  and 
Dickens.  But  it  is  nevertheless  our  duty  to  produce,  as 
evidences  that  superstition  is  still  rife  in  Britain  and  France, 
what  the  Caucasian  actually  says  of  himself,  in  the  year  of 
grace  1891. 

We  shall  quote  Caucasian  newspapers,  and,  if  we  prove 
that  superstition  exists  both  in  Britain  and  in  France,  we 
should  like  to  be  credited  with  having  virtually  proved  that 
superstition  exists,  not  only  in  Europe,  but  also  all  the 
Caucasian  world  over.  We  may  fairly  urge  this,  because 
Britain  and  France  are  the  pioneers  and  leaders  of  civiliza- 
tion— at  least  in  the  opinion  of  the  great  majority  of  the 
human  race ;  and  in  the  forefront  rank  of  nations.  If  we 
should  be  able  to  prove  that  temples  of  superstition  exist  in 
the  breasts  of  Britishers  and  Frenchmen,  and  that  the 
British  and  French  peoples  have  their  Mumbo  Jumbo, 
it  may  surely  be  taken  fur  granted,  that  whatever  is  true  for 
the  British  and  French  peoples,  on  the  score  of  super- 
stition, is  also  true  for  all  other  Caucasian  peoples,  who  are 
less  enlightened  than  they. 

When  we  tell  the  reader  that  we  have  the  authority  of 
Lord  Macaulay  for  saying,  that  the  only  true  history  of  a 
country  is  to  be  found  in  its  newspapers,  he  will  understand 
why  we  are  so  concerned  about  quoting  the  newspapers. 
But  we  should  not  like  it  to  be  forgotten  that  we  have 
already  proved,  more  or  less,  that  superstition  existed,  and 
does  exist,  amongst  Caucasians. 

What  we  have  now  to  do  is  to  produce  more  proofs  of 
the  fact  that  superstition  exists  in  this  nineteenth  century, 
and  even  in  this  year  of  grace  1891.  We  must  allow  the 
Caucasian  to  speak  for  himself  and  for  his  people.  Lloyd's 
News.,  a  British  Liberal  Unionist  newspaper,  of  April  26, 
1891,  says:  'During  the  week  there  has  been  considerable  ex- 


148  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

citement  at  Deptford  through  the  rumour  that  a  ghost  was  to 
be  seen  at  night  time  by  the  door  under  the  portico  of  St. 
Paul's  Church.  Thousands  of  persons  have  assembled  out- 
side, and  a  special  force  of  police  had  to  be  called  out. 
The  other  night  a  man  climbed  over  the  railings,  and  ascer- 
tained that  the  scare  was  occasioned  by  some  bills  that  had 
been  posted  on  the  church  door,  which  were  visible  from 
the  gate  when  the  moonlight  shone  upon  them,  and  dis- 
appeared when  a  cloud  passed  over  the  moon.  Upon  the 
removal  of  the  bills  no  more  was  seen  of  the  ghost.' 

Just  imagine  the  good  people  of  Deptford  believing  in 
Junabaes  !  In  Deptford  there  are  Her  Britannic  Majesty's 
Naval  Victualling  Yard  and  Naval  Dock  Yard;  there  are 
several  educational  and  benevolent  institutions,  the  Royal 
Naval  School  included  among  the  former,  whilst  the  number 
of  churches  in  Deptford  is  legion  ;  and  yet,  with  all  these 
evidences  of  civilization  in  its  midst,  Deptford  is  super- 
stitious. 

What,  in  our  humble  opinion,  makes  Deptford's  ofTence 
still  more  heinous,  is  the  fact  that  it  is  a  suburb  and  part 
and  parcel  of  the  British  Metropolis.  And  do  we  not  know 
that  London  is  the  capital  and  centre  of  the  United  King- 
dom, the  capital  and  centre  of  the  British  Empire,  which 
embraces  12,000,000  square  miles,  and  contains  over 
350,000,000  of  inhabitants,  the  capital  and  centre  of  the 
greatest  and  largest  Empire  the  world  has  ever  seen  ? 
Does  not  London  share  with  Paris  the  capitalship  and 
centreship  of  civilization  ?  And  we  might  almost  say  that 
London  is  the  capital  of  the  world.  And  yet  in  that 
colossal  and  leviathan  London  there  is  this  gross  superstitio 
— a  belief  in  his  Weird  and  Ghostly  Majesty  King  Mumbc 
Jumbo. 

The  Star,  a  British  Gladstonian  Liberal  newspaper,  ol 
April   28,   1891,  says:    'Mr.  Drury    Wake,  the    chairman 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.   149 

of  the  Northampton  County  Petty  Sessions,  whose  death 
has  just  been  reported,  was  a  direct  descendant  of  the 
famous  Hereward  Le  Wake,  and  an  uncle  of  the  present 
Sir  Hereward  Wake,  of  Courteen  Hall,  Northampton.  His 
mother,  the  Dowager  Lady  Wake,  was  a  sister  of  the  late 
Archbishop  Tait,  who  was  a  frequent  preacher  at  the  pretty 
little  church  at  Ritsford,  in  which  village  this  branch  of  the 
Wake  family  have  resided  for  many  years. 

'Both  Mr.  Drury  and  Colonel  Baldwin  Wake  married 
the  two  only  daughters  of  the  late  Mr.  Henry  O.  Nethercote, 
the  genial  Liberal  squire  of  Moulton,  who  was  an  intimate 
friend  of  Earl  Spencer,  and  an  eloquent  speaker  on  behalf 
of  the  Liberal  cause. 

*This  death  in  the  Wake  family  closes  a  somewhat 
romantic  story.  Many  years  ago,  when  the  brothers  Wake 
wooed  the  squire's  two  daughters,  Baldwin  was  a  captain  in 
the  Hussars,  and  a  very  popular  gentleman  in  the  village. 
The  night  before  his  marriage  he  took  a  dose  of  medicine 
to  induce  sleep,  which  succeeded  only  too  well,  and  he 
slept  so  long  that  his  marriage  had  to  be  postponed  for 
a  day. 

*  Seven  years  ago  Colonel  Baldwin  Wake  discussed  with 
the  squire  a  question  which  brought  ill-feeling.  The  unfor- 
tunate Colonel  went  to  his  room  after  the  discussion,  and 
by  way  of  inducing  sleep,  from  the  want  of  which  he  greatly 
suffered,  took  an  overdose  of  a  mixture,  from  which  he  died 
during  the  night.  Within  the  space  of  a  year  the  squire 
himself  was  dead,  a  servant  committed  suicide  in  the  lake, 
other  deaths  occurred,  and  popular  superstition  and  village 
gossip  were  much  exercised.^ 

We  can  readily  believe  that  Northampton  has  superstition 
in  its  midst.  If  there  is  superstition  in  London,  no  one 
must  wonder  that  Northamptonians  are  also  superstitious. 
London  is  the  chief  city  of  the  United  Kingdom,  and  is  sup- 


150  THE  LONE- STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

posed  to  be  greatly  enlightened,  and  quite  the  most  civilized 
portion  of  the  United  Kingdom ;  and  yet  Londoners  are 
superstitious  :  we  must  expect,  therefore,  that  Northamp- 
tonshire, a  county  and  country  province  of  the  United 
Kingdom,  is  less  enlightened  and  less  civilized  than 
London,  and  that  Northamptonians  are  more  superstitious 
than  Londoners.  Where  there  is  the  greater  ignorance, 
there  the  greater  superstition  will  be  found. 

Northampton  has  educational  and  benevolent  establish- 
ments like  Deptford ;  it  has  Government,  Grammar,  and 
Bluecoat  Schools,  School-boards,  and  Hospitals,  as  well  as 
Churches  and  Friendly  Hospitals,  It  has  more.  For  we 
are  told  that  Northampton  has  flour  and  paper  mills, 
breweries,  foundries,  churches,  makings,  town-hall,  corn- 
exchange,  curryings.  Government  works,  and  is  noted  for 
its  lace,  boots  and  shoes,  and  various  manufactures.  Yet 
superstition,  meet  offspring  of  ignorance,  is  an  institution 
among  the  good  people  of  Northamptonshire.  That 
Squire  Nethercote  perished  within  a  year  after  the  death 
of  his  son-in-law,  Colonel  Baldwin  "Wake,  was  nothing 
supernatural  ;  nor  can  we  understand  why  the  Northamp- 
tonians should  be  so  superstitious  because,  forsooth,  as 
the  Star  tells  us,  a  servant  committed  suicide  in  one  of  the 
lakes ! 

The  Daily  Telegraph,  a  British  semi-Conservative  News- 
paper, of  April  30,  1891,  says:  'The  churchyard  of  the 
Greyfriars  was,  previous  to  the  Reformation,  the  most 
fashionable  cemetery  in  London,  no  fewer  than  four  British 
Queens  having  found  sepulture  there.  The  ghost  of  one 
of  these  female  Sovereigns,  Isabella,  the  disreputable  con- 
sort of  Edward  IL,  was  long  supposed  to  haunt  the 
cloisters  of  the  (Christ's)  hospital ;  but  the  phantom  seems 
of  late  years  to  have  been  laid  in  the  Red  Sea,  together 
with  that  of  Nell  Cook,  whose  apparition  no  longer  terrifies 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.    151 

small  boys  who  venture  on  Friday  nights  into  the  dark  entry 
of  the  Close  of  Canterbury  Cathedral.' 

We  do  not  share  the  views  of  the  Daily  Telegraph  when  it 
says  that  'the  phantom  seems  of  late  years  to  have  been  laid 
in  the  Red  Sea,  together  with  that  of  Nell  Cook,'  because  we 
are  convinced  that  the  same  belief  in,  and  dread  of,  ghosts 
or  phantoms  exists  to-day  amongst  Londoners  and  other 
Britishers.  A  Huntingdonshire  coroner's  jury,  which  sat  at 
Warboys,  to  inquire  into  the  circumstances  connected  with 
the  death  of  a  young  inebriated  British  tailor  (named 
Andrews),  who,  on  being  pursued  by  the  indignant  hus- 
band of  the  married  woman  he  had  indecently  assaulted, 
when  he  was  returning  homewards  from  the  athletic  sports 
held  at  Ramsay,  fell  into  a  reservoir,  and  after  experiencing 
an  undesirable  douche^  committed  suicide  by  throwing  him- 
self in  front  of  a  passing  train,  returned  a  verdict  to  the 
effect  that  the  said  Andrews  had  committed  suicide  '  at  the 
instigation  of  the  Devil'  We  find  the  Daily  Telegraph  of 
April  6,  1 89 1,  commenting  on  the  silly  verdict  given  by 
these  superstitious  Huntingdonshire  jurymen  only  a  few 
days  before,  expresses  the  opinion  that,  'To  declare  the 
inebriated  tailor,  who  threw  himself,  or  accidentally  fell, 
across  the  rails,  and  was  cut  to  pieces  by  a  passing  train, 
was  moved  to  the  commission  of  the  rash  act  by  the  direct 
"  instigation  of  the  Devil "  argues  an  acquaintance  on  the 
part  of  the  Huntingdonshire  coroner's  jury  with  the  ordi- 
nary course  of  procedure  of  the  Enemy  of  Mankind  so 
familiar  as  to  be,  to  say  the  least,  remarkable.  We  are 
bound,  however,  in  justice,  to  remember  that  Huntingdon- 
shire is  a  very  ancient  county,  in  which,  possibly,  many  old- 
world  superstitions  may  yet  linger  :  and  in  districts  where 
mediseval  traditions  and  folk-lore  still  obtain,  it  may  with 
tolerable  confidence  be  assumed  that  the  Gothic  Satan — 
horns,  hoofs,  tail  and  all — continues  to  play  a  conspicuous 


152  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

part  in  them.  A  fourth  part  of  this  fertile  shire  was 
formerly,  according  to  old  Fuller,  Abbey  land,  belonging 
to  monks  and  friars. 

*  The  town  to  which  the  hapless  tailor  repaired  was  once 
known  as  "  Ramsey  the  Rich,"  and  in  the  palmy  days  of 
British  monachism  the  income  of  its  abbey,  which  had  only 
sixty  monks  to  maintain,  amounted  to  no  less  than  ;£^7,ooo 
a  year.  Now,  Lucifer,  we  all  know,  was  never  tired  of 
plaguing  the  monks.  He  set  traps  for  them,  he  tempted 
them,  he  did  his  evil  best  to  delude  and  beguile  those  holy 
men ;  although  now  and  again  the  foul  Fiend  was  caught 
in  his  own  trap,  as  was  notably  the  case  with  that  malicious 
Demon  who  strove  to  interrupt  the  studies  of  the  good 
St.  Dominic.  That  excellent  saint  was  sitting  up  very  late 
one  night,  writing,  by  the  light  of  a  single  candle  stuck  in  a 
lump  of  clay,  a  sociable  folio  .  .  .  when  his  cheerful  task 
was  sought  to  be  thwarted  by  the  Fiend,  who  made  divers 
but  ineffectual  attempts  to  blow  out  the  holy  man's  candle. 
St.  Dominic,  indeed,  gained  so  complete  a  victory  over  the 
emissary  from  the  nether  regions  as  to  force  him  to  go 
humbly  on  his  knees  and  hold  the  candle,  while  his  sancti- 
fied opponent  went  on  merrily  penning  his  advocacy  .  .  . 
until  the  socketless  candle,  burning  down  to  the  fag-end, 
began  to  grill  the  Devil's  fingers,  causing  him  to  howl 
dismally ;  for  Satan,  we  know  from  Milton,  can  feel  and 
has  felt  pain.  This  may  have  been  the  kind  of  Demon 
who,  in  the  thinking  of  coroners'  juries  in  Huntingdonshire, 
goes  up  and  down  "instigating"  tipsy  tailors  to  throw 
themselves  on  the  permanent  way ;  and,  for  aught  we  can 
tell,  the  Warboys  and  Ramsey  Devil  may  be  the  selfsame 
demon  who  strove  to  annoy  St.  Dominic,  and  got  so  soundly 
trounced  for  his  pains.  For  Beelzebub,  it  is  notorious,  is 
ubiquitous.  "  Where  are  you  damned  ?"  Satan  is  asked  in 
the  Elizabethan  play.     "  Everywhere,"  is  the  reply ;  and 


I 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  153 

the  Mephisto  who  was  the  perdition  of  Faust  may  be 
identical  with  the  Fiend  who,  as  the  eccentric  coroner's 
jury  think,  roams  about  the  pleasant  county  of  Huntingdon, 
"instigating"  intoxicated  youths  to  do  desperate  deeds. 
Only,  in  the  lamentable  case  of  the  wretched  young  tailor, 
Andrews,  the  worthy  jurymen  do  not  appear  to  have  given 
the  Devil  his  due.  He  is  credited  with  one  act  of  instiga- 
tion, whereas,  if  the  strange  hypothesis  of  the  Huntingdon- 
shire sages  be  a  correct  one,  he  must  have  been  guilty  of 
three  distinct  and  consecutive  suggestions  of  a  diabolical 
character.  First,  he  must  have  instigated  Andrews  to 
attend  the  agricultural  sports  at  Ramsey,  with  the  full 
knowledge  and  cognizance  that  the  tailor  would  be  led  by 
the  delirious  excitement  of  wrestling,  leaping,  running,  or 
football,  to  drink  too  much  beer.  Next,  Andrews  being 
fuddled,  the  Devil  must  have  "  instigated "  him  to  assault 
the  married  female ;  and  his  final  act  of  instigation  must 
have  been  to  whisper  in  the  drunken  fugitive's  ear,  "  Throw 
yourself  in  front  of  the  train  and  get  smashed  !" 

*  In  one  respect  the  Fiend  seems  to  be  open  to  the 
reproach  of  having  committed  a  slight  error  of  judgment. 
Why  did  he  allow  the  flying  tailor  to  fall  into  the  reservoir? 
"Too  much  water,"  had  poor  Ophelia,  for  she  was  drowned  ; 
but  Andrews  was  dragged,  or  managed  to  scramble,  out  of 
the  reservoir.  One  would  have  thought  that  the  abundant 
"  douche "  would  at  least  have  partially  sobered  him. 
Perhaps  Mephisto,  feeling  sure  of  his  prey,  had  momentarily 
flown  away  a  few  thousands  of  miles  to  see  if  there  was 
anything  or  anybody  requiring  his  friendly  offices — say  in 
the  interior  of  Africa,  or  in  Burmah,  or  in  the  State  of 
Louisiana — and  that,  returning  to  Huntingdonshire,  although 
drenched,  still  drunk,  and  still  dashing  across  country,  he 
addressed  himself  to  his  final  act  of  instigation,  and  saw 
his   victim   comfortably   under   the   wheels   of    the    loco- 


154  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

motive.  It  may  be  finally  asked,  by  some  inveterate 
sceptics,  how  the  coroner's  jury  arrived  at  the  know- 
ledge that  the  miserable  Andrews  was  instigated  by  the 
Devil  at  all?  The  reply  to  such  a  question  might  be  a 
sufficiently  simple  one,  "They  are'"  (answers  the  Daily 
Telegraphy  correctly  and  wisely)  '  "  a  very  old-fashioned 
people  down  in  Huntingdonshire;  and  implicit  biilief  in 
a  personal  and  indefatigably  prompting  and  suggesting 
Fiend  is  an  extremely  antique  belief." '  That  '■  belief,'  we 
say,  is  a  superstitious  one. 

The  Daily  Telegraph  for  June  29,  189 1,  also  says, 
'There  are  probably  vast  numbers  of  foolish  people 
(amongst  Britishers),  and  not  a  few  cultured  and  intelligent 
ones  (not  leaving  out  numerous  clergymen,  and  a  still 
larger  number  of  ladies),  who  believe  in  astrology  as  firmly 
as  the  Chaldaeans,  the  Assyrians,  and  the  Greeks  did,  and 
as  many  Oriental  nations  continue  to  do  to  this  day. 

*  Fashionable  (British)  society  is  just  now  infested  by  a 
number  of  female  adventuresses,  who,  by  means  of  various 
"subtle  devices,"  are  openly  and  insolently  carrying  on 
their  trade  as  fortune-tellers  for  hire  and  gain.  Let  the 
police  come  down  like  a  wolf  on  the  fold  on  the  well- 
dressed,  well-installed,  well-puffed,  and  largely  patronized 
fortune-tellers  of  the  West-end,  and  bring  the7n  to  the  bar 
of  justice.' 

The  Daily  Telegraph  for  October  7,  1891,  good- 
humouredly  asserts  that  *  New  Kent  Road  affords  a  magni- 
ficent chance  at  this  moment  for  a  Mahatma.  Hundreds 
of  people  in  the  neighbourhood  are  firmly  convinced  that  a 
house  in  that  busy  thoroughfare  is  occupied  by  a  ghostly 
inhabitant.  Like  the  mysterious  individuals  of  whom  a 
great  deal  has  been  heard  lately,  the  spirit  is  extremely 
chary  of  showing  itself.  Crowds  assemble  in  front  of  the 
house,  knock  at  the  door,  and  ring  the  bell,  in  the  hope  of 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.    155 

awakening  the  ghost  to  a  sense  of  its  public  responsibilities, 
but  without  any  result,  except  that  of  driving  fanatic  the 
good  citizen  who  has  the  misfortune  to  live  on  the  premises. 
Some  weeks  ago  a  young  man  was  fined  twenty  shillings  for 
creating  a  disturbance  at  the  house.  This  does  not  seem 
to  have  had  the  desired  effect,  for  now  a  dame  named  — — 
has  been  summoned  before  the  Lambeth  magistrate  for  a 
similar  offence.  A  police-officer  said  there  were  about  two: 
hundred  people  assembled  in  front  of  the  "  haunted  hous;e  " 
making  a  great  noise,  prominent  among  them  being  the 
accused,  who  appeared  to  be  in  a  state  of  great  excitement, 
and  was  demanding  wildly  to  see  the  ghost.  Mr.  Re- 
fined her  forty  shillings — a  tidy  sum  to  pay  for  not  seeing  a; 
disembodied  spirit.  It  is  refreshing  to  find  that  the  in- 
habitants of  New  Kent  Road  remain  genuinely  unaffected 
by  the  materialistic  tendencies  of  the  age.' 

Superstition,  then,  exists  throughout  the  United  King- 
dom ;  yet  it  would  seem  that  neither  W.  Laird  Clowes  nor 
James  Anthony  Froude  pay  due  heed  to  //.  It  has  been 
shown  to  exist  not  only  in  the  Metropolis  of  the  British. 
Empire,  but  also  in  the  provinces — Northamptonshire  and 
Huntingdonshire  affording  striking  examples. 

We  also  apply  the  term  'superstitious'  to  those  of  the  British 
people  who  believe  in  the  so-called  '  spiritualistic  seances,' 
at  which  the  'spiritualistic'  mediums  give  out  that  they 
have  the  power  to  summon  the  dead  to  appear,  as  well 
as  absent  living  persons.  The  belief  in  such  things  is 
certainly  to  be  classed  *  superstition.'  And  it  appears  that 
this  kind  of  superstition  exists  not  only  in  Europe  and  in 
America,  but  in  other  parts  of  the  habitable  globe,  where 
there  are  to  be  found  these  so-called  spiritualists. 

We  are  of  opinion  that  the  term  '  superstitious '  should 
be  applied  to  all  those  Britishers  and  Yankees  who  are 
members  of  the  Theosophical  Society,  which  was  founded* 


156  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

a  few  years  ago,  by  Madame  H.  P.  Blavatsky,  who  is  re- 
garded by  many  as  nothing  less  than  a  fraud.  Madame 
Blavatsky  gave  out  that  she  had  the  power  of  performing 
miracles.  But  this  same  Madame  Blavatsky  is  confidently 
asserted  by  some  to  have  been  of  doubtful  moral  character. 
What  is  historically  certain  is  that  she  deserted  her  own 
husband.  Not  much  confidence  can  be  placed  in  the  ex- 
travagant pretensions  of  such  a  woman,  when  she  claims 
to  be  inspired  and  to  have  the  power  of  working  miracles. 
'Truth  is  stranger  than  fiction,'  they  say,  yet  she  could 
reckon  among  her  dupes  eminent  scholars  and  authors — 
like  Mrs.  Annie  Besant,  the  friend  and  collaborator  of 
Charles  Bradlaugh,  and  'pretty,  piquant-looking,'  little 
Mrs.  Annie  Wolf  of  New  York,  who  writes  under  the  nom 
de  plume  of  Emily — who  implicitly  believed  in  Blavatsky's 
prophetic  and  miraculous  powers. 

The  gift  of  prophecy  was  given  to  holy  men  like  Isaiah, 
Jeremiah,  Ezekiel,  Daniel,  and  the  minor  prophets,  by 
Jehovah;  and  the  same  Almighty  Being  gave  the  power 
of  performing  miracles  to  such  holy  men  as  Saints  Peter, 
Paul  and  John;  but  we  certainly  cannot  think  that  God 
ever  did,  or  ever  would  give,  the  prophetic  or  the  miraculous 
power  to  such  a  person  as  Madame  Blavatsky,  whose 
historical  record  will  not  bear  investigation.  What  is  the 
world  coming  to,  when  an  impostor  like  Madame  Blavatsky 
can  so  easily  find  believers  ? 

We  now  pass  on  to  consider  Superstition  in  France. 
Wright,  in  his  work,  published  1852,  says  :  'In  France,  as 
in  England,  and,  indeed,  in  most  countries,  they  (the 
legends)  are  usually  connected  in  the  popular  belief  with 
fairies  or  with  demons,  and  in  England  with  Robin  Hood. 
In  France  this  latter  personage  is  replaced  by  Gargantua,  a 
name  made  generally  celebrated  by  the  extraordinary 
romance  of  Rabelais. 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  157 

'The  prohibition  to  worship  stones,  occurring  so  fre- 
quently in  the  earlier  Christian  ecclesiastical  laws  and 
ordinances,  relates  doubtless  to  these  Druidical  monuments, 
and  was  often  the  cause  of  their  destruction.  Traces  of 
this  worship  still  remain.  In  some  instances  people  passed 
through  the  Druidical  monuments  for  trial,  or  for  purifica- 
tion, or  as  a  mode  of  defensive  charm.  It  is  still  a  practice 
among  the  peasantry  at  Columbiers,  in  France,  for  young 
girls  who  want  husbands  to  climb  upon  the  cromlech  called 
the  Pierre-levee^  place  there  a  piece  of  money,  and  then 
jump  down.  At  Guerande,  with  the  same  object,  they 
depose  in  the  crevices  of  a  Celtic  monument  bits  of  rose- 
coloured  wool  tied  with  tinsel.  The  people  of  Croisic 
dance  round  a  menhir.  It  is  the  popular  belief  in  Anjou 
that  the  fairies,  as  they  descended  the  mountains,  spinning 
by  the  way,  brought  down  the  Druidical  stones  in  their 
aprons,  and  placed  them  as  they  are  now  found.'* 

These  superstitious  customs  and  beliefs,  which  existed  in 
France  thirty-nine  years  ago,  still  obtain  to-day.  Indeed, 
many  a  French  damsel  who  is  in  need  of  that  precious 
article,  a  husband,  is  in  the  habit  of  first  partaking  of  a 
salted  egg — water  to  allay  thirst  not  being  permitted  to 
the  fair  candidate  for  matrimonial  honours  —  and  then 
retiring  to  bed  in  silence,  without  speaking  to  anyone,  on 
every  24th  of  June,  that  is,  on  St.  John  the  Baptist's  Day. 

A  Correspondent  of  the  Daily  Graphic^  a  British  Conser- 
vative organ,  in  a  letter  published  on  the  15th  of  April, 
189 1,  says  concerning  a  *  Haunted  House,'  at  Nice  :  'Some 
jtime  ago  Nice  was  in  a  ferment.     A  house  in  Le  Port,  at 

le  foot  of  the  quarries,  in  a  terrace  that  has  not  the  faintest 
look  of  the  uncanny,  was  said  to  be  haunted.  Crowds 
often  gathered  outside  it,  though,  I  believe,  the  "experiences" 

*  *The  Celt,  the  Roman,  and  the  Saxon,'  chap,  ii.,  p.  63, 
by  T.  Wright. 


15B  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

were  strictly  confined  to  those  within.  Sometimes  there 
were  two  thousand  "  encumbering"  the  road,  as  the  inhabi- 
tants put  it.  Sometimes  there  were  three  thousand ! 
Mounted  police  were  employed  to  prevent  a  hopeless 
block.  Arriving  at  Nice  the  other  day,  the  first  person 
I  asked,  "Where  is  the  haunted  house?"  said,  "Why,  to  be 
sure,  it  is  just  at  the  corner  of  the  harbour."  I  found  that 
•every  cabman  knew  his  way  there.  My  "  cocher "  said : 
"  You  want  to  take  views.  No  portraits  of  ghosts  by  daylight, 
ter  Besides,  he's  not  there  now."  "Where  is  he?"  I 
asked.  "  Who  knows  ?"  said  cabby.  "  What  was  the  ex- 
planation of  the  occurrences  ?"  I  inquired,  for  I  fancied  my 
man  might  be  a  sceptic.  But  he  was  no  doubter  at  all. 
He  averred  that  explanation  there  was  none  ;  and  he 
laughed,  shrugged  his  shoulders,  looked  sheepish  and 
mischievous  by  turns.  He  seemed  anxious  to  guard 
against  possible  disappointment,  for  he  repeated  the 
assurance  that  I  had  not  a  chance  of  seeing  the  ghost  by 
day ;  but  the  house  could  be  photographed. 

'The  ghost's  conflict  in  this  house  was,  to  say  the  least, 
peculiar.  Darkness  would  descend  upon  everything,  and 
then  the  inmates  would  be  beaten  !  No  assailants  were 
ever  visible,  and  it  was  not  the  darkness  which  "  could  be 
felt,"  but  blows  —  blows,  too,  which  left  bruises.  The 
excitement  caused  by  the  recurrence  of  these  mysterious 
assaults  led  to  an  organized  inquiry  by  the  police,  but  no 
explanation  was  ever  satisfactorily  established.  Once  twelve 
policemen  searched  the  premises  from  roof  to  basement, 
while  twelve  other  men  of  the  force  watched  the  house 
from  the  outside.  No  one  left  the  house  which  was  so 
carefully  guarded,  and  inside  nothing  rewarded  the  search 
till  the  twelve  men  had  examined  everything,  and  were 
congregated  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs,  on  the  point  of  leaving 
theplace,  when  suddenly  an  ink-jar  fell  among  them.    They 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.    159 

thought  by  the  sound  that  it  came  from  the  very  top  of  the 
house ;  and  attached  to  the  jar  was  a  paper  bearing  the 
words,  "  Try  as  you  will,  you'll  never  catch  me,"  or  some- 
thing to  that  effect. 

'  The  police  having  utterly  failed  to  unravel  the  mystery, 
and  the  nightly  blows  and  unexplained  darkness  recurring, 
some  of  the  bravest  and  strongest  young  men  banded  them- 
selves together  to  investigate  the  matter.  They  prepared 
to  sit  up  a  night  in  the  haunted  house,  and  provided  them- 
selves with  many  lamps,  and  with  cards  to  while  away  the 
vacant  hours.  Suddenly  all  the  lamps  throughout  the  house 
were  extinguished,  and  blows  were  rained  upon  the  hardy 
youths  without  their  being  able  to  guess  whence  they  were 
assaulted,  or  who  were  the  assailants.  No  one  was  any  the 
wiser  for  this  experiment,  except  the  doughty  champions, 
who  were  certainly  sadder  and  sorer,  if  wiser,  men  next 
morning. 

'  Of  course  the  usual  explanations — coiners,  illicit  still, 
burglars'  place  of  meeting — were  offered  to  account  for  the 
mystery,  but  the  premises  do  not  lend  themselves  to  any 
of  these  theories.  One  thing  seems  clear  :  there  is  now  no 
ghost  at  the  place,  which  is  the  factory  of  a  marble-worker. 
But  the  manner  of  his  passing  is  as  little  understood  as  was 
the  manner  of  his  coming ;  and  it  is  not  one  ghost  in  a 
hundred  that  sets  a  city,  the  civic  fathers,  and  their  police 
all  agog.' 

Comment  on  this  quotation  is  surely  needless. 

The  Paris  correspondent  of  the  Daily  Telegraphy  writing 
to  that  journal,  on  the  2nd  of  June,  1891,  also  testifies  to 
French  superstition  when  he  says  :  *  There  has  been  great 
excitement  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Saleix,  situated  in  the 
■  Department  of  the  Ariege,  and  the  country  people  have 
been  trooping  to  the  spot  to  contemplate  a  girl  who  pro- 
fessed to  have  seen  visions.     She  was  asked  by  her  visitors 


i6o  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

a  variety  of  questions  about  the  future;  to  which  she 
appears  to  have  replied  to  their  entire  satisfaction,  for  every 
day  they  arrived  in  increasing  numbers.  The  small  cottage 
which  she  inhabits  with  her  parents  was  literally  besieged, 
and  at  last  the  Maire,  alarmed  at  the  formidable  propor- 
tions which  this  pilgrimage  was  assuming,  called  on  the 
gendarmerie  to  interfere.  The  people  were  induced  to 
return  to  their  homes  without  more  ado,  and  since  their 
departure  the  girl  gives  out  that  she  has  not  been  favoured 
with  any  more  visions.' 

Superstition,  then,  having  been  proved  to  be  prevalent 
amongst  both  the  French  and  British  people,  and  these  two 
nations  having  been  shown  to  be  the  leaders  of  modern 
civilization  and  progress,  it  may  be  taken  for  granted  that 
superstition  obtains  to  some  extent  amongst  other  and  less 
civilized  Caucasians. 

The  St.  Stephens  Review  of  May  2,  1891,  writing  on  the 
general  incompetency  and  demoralization  of  the  Portuguese, 
one  of  the  most  backward  people  in  Europe,  is  of  opinion 
that  '  At  home  the  "  Portugee"  is  an  ignorant,  superstitious, 
unenlightened  being.' 

Lloyd's  News  of  August  23,  1891,  testifies  to  German 
superstition  in  this  wise:  'The  "army  grub"  or  worm,  a 
caterpillar  which  marches  in  procession  of  many  thousands 
at  a  time,  has  created  alarm  in  the  Hurz  district.  There  is 
a  superstition  in  Germany  that  the  appearance  of  this  insect 
forebodes  war,  failure  of  the  crops  and  famine.' 

The  Yankees,  too,  are  just  as  superstitious  as  the  British, 
French,  and  other  peoples.  Dalziel's  Agency,  telegraphing 
from  New  York,  under  the  date  of  June  2,  1891,  says: 
'  The  New  York  Tribune  publishes  the  following  remarkable 
story  :  *  Two  years  ago  a  woman,  whose  name  could  not  be 
learned,  one  Monday  presented  herself  at  the  Manhattan 
Eye  and  Ear  Hospital  for  treatment.     She  was  found  to 


1 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  16 1 

be  suffering  with  a  bad  case  of  nasal  catarrh,  and  was  placed 
under  the  care  of  Dr.  Johnson.  The  patient  received  due 
attentfon,  and  went  her  way.  Dr.  Johnson  died  suddenly 
two  days  later.  Six  months  passed  before  this  patient 
went  to  the  hospital  again  to  be  treated  for  the  same 
trouble.  The  "  cabinet"  in  which  such  patients  are  received, 
examined,  and  receive  their  treatment,  was  then  in  charge 
of  Dr.  Pond.  That  gentleman  did  everything  possible  for 
the  patient,  and  she  went  home.  Dr.  Pond  died  within 
two  days.  His  death  was  ascribed  by  the  attending  physi- 
cian to  the  now  common  cause  of  "heart  failure,"  though 
he  had  not  been  subject  to  trouble  with  that  organ.  The 
second  death  after  attendance  upon  this  patient  caused  a 
good  deal  of  comment  among  the  medical  and  nursing 
staffs  of  the  hospital. 

'  The  patient  remained  away,  however,  until  last  Wednes- 
day, when,  finding  her  old  trouble  again  making  her  life 
miserable,  she  once  more  applied  for  relief.  She  said  to 
the  clerk  that  she  feared  the  doctors  might  have  some 
hesitation  in  attending  to  her  case,  as  her  previous  visits 
had  been  followed  by  the  deaths  of  Drs.  Johnson  and  Pond. 
Her  surmise  was  wrong,  for  she  was  promptly  attended  to 
by  Dr.  David  Phillips,  who  had  finally  succeeded  to  Dr. 
Pond's  department,  and  who  had  been  made  acquainted 
with  the  grim  joke  about  the  fatal  patient,  the  woman  being 
fully  identified  to  him  as  the  traditional  individual. 

'  Dr.  Phillips  was  dead  the  next  morning.  He  went  home 
after  treating  the  patient,  and  dined  with  a  itw  friends.  He 
then  made  some  professional  visits.  When  he  returned 
home  from  these,  he  complained  of  feeling  ill,  and  went 
directly  to  bed.  He  did  not  make  his  appearance  at  the 
usual  time  in  the  morning,  and  his  mother,  who  went  to 
awaken  him,  saw  him  apparently  in  a  sound  and  peaceful 
sleep.     She  did   not  disturb  him,  thinking   a   long  sleep 

II 


i62  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

would  do  him  good.  No  effort  was  made  to  arouse  him 
until  luncheon-time,  when  the  family  discovered,  to  their 
horror,  that  he  was  dead.  A  physician  was  called.  When 
he  arrived,  and  had  examined  the  body,  he  gave  it  as  his 
opinion  that  Dr.  Phillips  had  died  in  his  sleep  of  heart 
failure  several  hours  previously. 

*Dr.  Phillips  was  regarded  by  his  associates  as  an  excellent 
throat  and  nose  specialist,  and  a  good  general  physician. 
He  had  great  ability  in  diagnosis,  and  was  always  consulted 
when  complicated  cases  came  to  the  hospital.  The  officers 
of  the  hospital  are  reticent  about  the  case.  They  admit 
that  there  is  an  extraordinary  degree  of  excitement  among 
members  of  the  medical  profession  ;  and  the  staff  of  the 
Manhattan  Hospital  is  being  watched,  with  the  expectation 
that  another  funeral  may  shortly  take  place,  with  one  of  its 
members  as  a  subject.' 

With  all  these  superstitions  prevailing  among  the  Cauca- 
sians, which  he  is  either  ignorant  of,  or  is  aware  of  yet  has 
overlooked,  Mr.  Laird  Clowes,  instead  of  attending  to 
matters  nearer  home,  which  might  so  well  interest  him,  pre- 
fers to  attend  to  matters  which  do  not  specially  concern  him, 
and  might  well  have  been  left  alone  until  he  had  delivered 
the  Caucasian  world  from  its  superstitions.  Laird  Clowes, 
on  pages  112  to  114  of  'Black  America,'  says:  'Nor 
will  I  say  much  concerning  the  degrading  superstitions  and 
superstitious  practices  of  the  great  mass  of  ignorant  blacks. 
Two  years  ago  the  Herald,  a  respectable  paper  in  Boston, 
published  an  article,  five  and  a  half  columns  long,  the  object 
of  which  was  to  demonstrate  that  Voodooism  existed  to  an 
alarming  extent  among  the  African  people  of  Boston  and 
New  England  generally.      Here  are  a  couple  of  extracts  : 

'  "  No  people  are  so  prone,  by  nature  and  force  of  circum- 
stances, to  superstition  as  the  blacks.  Devout  and  easily 
excited,  they  are  apt  to  accept,  blindly  and  without  reason- 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  163 

ing,  the  traditions  of  their  fathers ;  and  even  among  those 
of  reasonable  education  there  are  traces  of  idolatrous  creeds 
and  customs,  which  have  always  characterized  the  West 
India  Negroes.  Voodooism,  of  which  much  has  been 
hinted,  a  little  written,  but  almost  nothing  known— one  of 
the  blackest,  cruellest,  and  most  heathenish  forms  of  idolatry 
the  world  has  ever  seen — exists  to-day  to  an  alarming  ex- 
tent right  here  in  Puritan  New  England." 

*  "  Perhaps  the  fact  that  the  Negroes  have  always  regarded 
themselves  as  a  wronged  people  impels  them  to  cultivate 
a  revengeful  spirit,  and  the  prevailing  object  of  their  so- 
called  spells  is  in  the  direction  of  workings  harm  to  their 
enemies.  They  pay  more  attention  to  vengeance  than  to 
the  cure  of  diseases,  although  claiming  wonderful  power 
from  their  herbs  and  decoctions.  The  prevailing  sentiment, 
if  it  may  be  so  termed,  of  Voodooism,  aside  from  idolatry, 
is  revenge,  and  in  their  hatreds  these  people  are  implacable. 
No  punishment  is  too  horrible  to  be  visited  upon  their 
enemies." 

'  Most  white  Bostonians  believed,'  continues  Laird  Clowes, 
*  that  the  article  was  full  of  exaggerations,  but,  to  the 
general  surprise,  the  Negroes  practically  admitted  the  im- 
peachment. 

*  Here  is  part  of  a  resolution  which  was  passed  in  July, 
1889,  by  the  Coloured  National  League,  sitting  at  Boston  : 

' "  Whereas  the  Boston  Herald  has  lately  shown  that  the 
degrading  superstition  of  Voodooism,  as  well  as  its  practice, 
exists  here  in  Boston,  to  some  extent,  among  a  few  illiterate 
and  ignorant  persons  of  our  race ;  and  whereas  the  senti- 
ment among  the  better  class  of  coloured  people  is  that  no 
one  should  be  swifter  to  condemn  any  kind  of  foolish 
race  superstition  or  disreputable  practice  than  the  coloured 
people  themselves ;  and  whereas  it  should  everywhere  be 
the  aim  and  desire  of  the  coloured  p^jople  to  welcome  r.ny 

II — 2 


I64  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

information  that  may  show  the  need  of  greater  race  en- 
lightenment, or  that  shall  stir  us  up  to  more  earnest  efforts 
for  the  general  elevation  of  our  people ;  be  it  resolved  that 
the  League  places  itself  on  record  as  being  both  anxious 
and  willing  to  join  hands  with  the  Herald,  or  anyone  else, 
in  condemning,  discountenancing,  and  stamping  out  Voodoo- 
ism  or  any  other  '  ism  '  hurtful  to  the  physical,  moral,  or 
spiritual  elevation  of  the  coloured  people  ;  and  that  the 
League  calls  upon  good  coloured  people  everywhere  to  set 
their  face  like  a  flint  against  every  kind  of  evil  superstition, 
habit,  practice,  custom,  or  belief,  whose  tendency,  if  en- 
couraged, might  be  to  degrade,  belittle,  or  harm  the  coloured 
people  in  public  estimation."  ' 

We  are  not  prepared  to  deny  that  there  might  have  been 
some  sort  of  superstition  amongst  a  few  of  the  ignorant  and 
illiterate  American  Africans  of  Boston  some  years  ago,  but 
this  much  we  do  say,  that  we  certainly  deny  in  toto  Laird 
Clowes's  statement  that  '  the  great  mass  of  the  ignorant 
blacks '  in  America  are  superstitious,  as  we  also  give  a 
general  denial  to  the  statement,  as  made  by  the  Boston 
Herald,  that  '  no  people  are  so  prone  (to  superstition)  by 
nature  and  force  of  circumstances  as  the  blacks.'  Nor  is 
the  statement,  as  made  by  the  Boston  Herald,  and  quoted 
by  Laird  Clowes,  that  '  even  among  those  of  reasonable 
education  there  are  traces  of  the  idolatrous  creeds  and 
customs  which  have  always  characterized  the  West  Indian 
Negroes,'  anything  approaching  to  the  truth.  Neither  the 
Boston  Herald  nor  Laird  Clowes  attempt  to  support  this 
accusation  by  any  trustworthy  evidence.  It  is  one  thing  to 
affirm  that  some  American  Africans  of  '  reasonable  educa- 
tion '  have  '  traces  of  the  idolatrous  creeds  and  customs ' 
in  their  midst,  but  it  is  another  and  a  very  different  thing 
to  prove  that  they  are  in  the  generally  demoralized  condi- 
tion which  Laird  Clowes  and  the  Boston  Herald  allege  they 


I 


I 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.    165 


are  ?  Such  a  statement  as  we  have  given  from  the  Boston 
Herald^  that  'idolatrous  creeds  and  customs  .  .  .  have 
always  characterized  the  West  Indian  Negroes,'  can  be  only 
an  opinion  on  which  no  authority  rests.  It  is  not  given  to 
the  Caucasian  to  determine  absolutely  what  are  the  charac- 
teristics of  the  Ethiopian  races;  such  judgments  are  not 
within  their  right.  They  are  better  employed  in  determining 
the  peculiarities  of  their  own  race.  We  Africans  know  our- 
selves better  than  Caucasians  can  ever  hope  to  know  us ; 
and  we  take  this  opportunity  of  firmly  declaring  that 
*  idolatrous  creeds  and  customs  '  have  never  characterized 
the  West  Indian  Africans. 

We  turn  the  argument  against  our  traducers.  Caucasians 
know  themselves  better  than  we  Africans  can  ever  hope  to 
know  them ;  and  we  have  quoted  the  statements  of 
Caucasian  authors  and  editors  in  order  to  prove  that 
Caucasians  are  superstitious,  in  what  is,  unquestionably,  a 
most  demoralizing  way. 

Mr.  Laird  Clowes  proceeds  to  tell  us  that  American 
Africans,  as  represented  by  the  'Coloured  National  League' 
of  Boston,  '  to  the  general  surprise,'  '  practically  admitted 
the  impeachment.'  What  sort  of  impeachment  did  the 
'Coloured  National  League'  of  Boston  admit  'to  the  general 
surprise'?  That  which  the  National  League  admitted  in 
July,  1889,  was  this:  they  admitted  that  'the  supersthion 
of  Voodooism,  as  well  as  its  practice,  exists  (in  1889)  here 
in  Boston  to  some  extent,'  but  they  carefully  added,  '  among 
a  few  illiterate  and  ignorant  persons  of  our  race.'  That  is 
all  that  they  admitted.  They  did  not  admit,  and  very  pro- 
perly and  correctly  they  did  not  admit,  that  '  the  great  mass 
of  ignorant  blacks '  were  superstitious,  because  that  state- 
ment, as  made  by  Laird  Clowes,  was,  and  is,  the  reverse  of 
the  truth.  Nay  more,  the  '  Coloured  National  League  '  of 
Boston  never  admitted — and  very  rightly  they  did  not — that 


l66  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

*no  people  are  so  prone  by  nature  and  force  of  circum- 
stances to  superstition  as  the  blacks  ';  nor  did  they  admit 
that  *  even  among  those  of  reasonable  education  there  are 
traces  of  idolatrous  creeds  and  customs  which  have  always 
characterized  the  West  Indian  Negroes ' — for  two  very  good 
reasons  :  (i)  because  amongst  American  Africans  of  'reason- 
able education'  idolatry  and  superstition  do  not  exist,  though 
it  may  be  that  '  a  few  illiterate  and  ignorant  persons  of  our 
race  '  in  America  are  superstitious  :  they  are  none  of  them 
idolatrous  ;  (2)  because  their  African  countrymen  in  the 
West  Indies  have  never  been  characterized  by  '  idolatrous 
creeds  and  customs.' 

Men  of  more  than  '  reasonable  education '  amongst 
Caucasians  have  been  unenviably  distinguished  for  their 
superstitions.  In  Britain,  for  instance,  almost  all  the  British 
Kings,  from  Wessex  Egbert  (as  well  as  his  predecessors)  to  . 
the  First  German  George,  were  superstitious ;  and  in  France 
almost  all  the  French  Kings  before  and  from  Frankish  Clovis 
to  the  Bourbon  Louis  XV.  were  superstitious.  Did  not 
James  I.  of  England  and  Ireland,  and  VI.  of  Scotland,  the 
British  Solomon,  himself  write  his  '  Demonology,'  in  which 
he  professed  his  belief  in  witchcraft  ?  and  did  he  not  cause 
his  Parliament  to  pass  a  law  against  supposed  witches  and 
their  abettors  ?  That  unjust  and  disgraceful  law  was  actually 
enforced  year  after  year,  and  was  not  repealed  till  the  reign 
of  the  second  Hanoverian  George."^ 

Sir  Matthew  Hale,  a  man  of  the  greatest  eminence  and 
erudition,  and  a  voluminous  author,  who  lived  from  1609  to 
1676,  and  who  was  Lord  Chief  Justice  of  England  during 
the  maladministration  of  Britain  by  the  Merry  Monarch, 
openly  professed  himself  in  court  as  a  believer,  like  Coke 
and  Bacon,  in  witches  and  witchcraft,  and  when  any  unfor- 
tunate old  women  were  standing  their  trial  before  him  on 

*■  *  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  vii.,  p.  63,  ninth  edition. 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.    167 

the  charge  of  being  witches,  he  was  accustomed  to  bully 
the  jury  into  returning  a  verdict  of  '  guilty.'  And  these 
wretched  old  women  were  condemned  to  perish  either  on 
the  gibbet  or  in  the  fire."*^ 

Even  in  this  nineteenth  century  we  have  shown  super- 
stition to  be  found  amongst  Caucasians  '  of  reasonable 
education,'  in  London,  Northamptonshire,  Huntingdonshire, 
Cornwall,  and  Oxford,  as  well  as  among  the  people  of  Nice 
and  New  York. 

As  long  as  there  are  men  of  enlightenment  and  progress 
amongst  us  Africans,  to  organize  our  ranks  and  weed  out 
unsound  matter  from  our  midst,  the  African  race  all  the 
world  over  need  never  despair.  Because  of  its  manly 
resolution  and  outspokenness,  in  calling  on  illiterate  Africans 
to  abandon  their  superstitions,  we  congratulate  and  commend 
the  *  National  League  of  Boston.' 

The  Boston  Herald^  as  quoted  by  Mr.  Laird  Clowes,  also 
tells  us  that  :  '  Perhaps  the  fact  that  the  Negroes  have 
always  regarded  themselves  as  a  wronged  people  impels 
them  to  cultivate  a  revengeful  spirit.' 

What,  we  think,  the  Boston  Herald  should  have  said  is 
not  that  '  the  Negroes  have  always  regarded  themselves  as  a 
wronged  people,'  but  that  *  the  Africans  were  and  are  still 
a  wronged  people.'  Does  the  Boston  Herald,  and  does 
Mr.  Clowes,  forget  how  many  myriads  of  unsuspecting 
Africans  were  pitilessly  kidnapped  by  the  white  man,  taken 
from  their  native  home,  and  compelled  to  cross  the  ocean, 
and  endure  the  horrors  of  the  Middle  Passage — during  which 
many  committed  suicide,  and  many  more  perished  from 
brutal  and  inhuman  treatment — experienced  at  the  hands  of 
their  oppressors  ?     Are  not  the  Africans  a  cruelly,  shame- 

•*  'English  Cyclopaedia  of  Biography,'  vol.  iii.,  p.  256; 
Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  xxiv.,  pp.  621,  622;  ibid.,  vol.  xi., 
p.  382;  'Dictionary  of  National  Biography,'  vol.  xxiv.,  p.  19. 


i68  THE  LONE'STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

fully  wronged  people  ?  Does  the  Boston  Herald^  and  does 
the  Commissioner  of  the  Tijnes,  want  to  forget  the  injustice, 
the  cruelties,  the  unpardonable,  unimaginable  horrors  atten- 
dant on  African  Slavery  all  the  long  years  during  which  the 
white  man  forcibly  held  the  black  man  in  abject  thraldom  ? 
Were  the  Africans  not  a  wronged  people?  They  are  a 
wronged  people  to-day  even  as  they  were  in  the  past. 
When  the  British  Government  of  to-day  deliberately  passes 
over  deserving  and  capable  British  Africans  in  order  that 
the  scum  and  refuse  of  the  population  of  the  British  Isles 
may  be  provided  with  Colonial  Government  posts  and  other 
official  advantages,  must  not  Africans  be  considered  still  a 
wronged  people  ?  Does  not  the  Government  which  with- 
holds the  franchise  from  the  African  inhabitants  of  Cape 
Colony,  Natal,  Gold  Coast,  Jamaica,  Trinidad,  British 
Honduras,  and  other  places,  wrong  the  Africans  ? 

The  Australian  Africans  have  also  their  grievances  in 
that — though  New  South  Wales,  Victoria,  Queensland, 
South  Australia,  etc.,  are  self-governing  Colonies — the 
black  aborigines  do  not  enjoy  the  franchise;  the  alien 
colonists  exercise  the  franchise,  and  are  thus  enabled  to 
lord  it  over  the  proper  inhabitants  of  the  land.  When  the 
Yankees  almost  daily  lynch  the  Africans  and  succeed  in 
evading  justice,  must  not  the  American  Africans  be  spoken 
of  as  a  wronged  people  ? 

In  the  South,  as  well  as  in  other  parts  of  the  United 
States,  the  Africans,  because  they  are  deprived  of  the  rights 
conferred  upon  them  by  the  Constitution,  can  be  none 
other  than  a  wronged  people.  When  the  authorities  of  the 
United  States  fail  to  mete  out  justice  to  their  African 
fellow-countrymen  in  the  judicial  courts,  by  refusing  to  give 
them  a  fair  trial,  or  by  failing  to  punish  those  of  the  white 
people  in  the  States  who  oppress  them,  what  must  they 
(the  Africans)  be  considered  but  a  wronged  people,  and  an 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.    169 

mhappy  people  ?  The  acts  of  injustice  and  the  outrages 
committed  upon  them  in  America  are  notorious  :  they  are 
a  crying  shame  in  a  land  which  arrogates  to  itself  the 
dignified  name  of  '  Civilized  '  America  ! 

There  are  many  parts  of  the  United  States  in  which 
Africans  are  practically  prevented  from  earning  an  honest 
dollar. 

Some  Africans  had  replaced  some  white  miners  who  were 
on  strike  at  the  latter  end  of  January  of  last  year  (1891),  at 
the  Carbon  Hill  Coal  Mines,  in  Walker  County,  near 
Birmingham,  Alabama,  and  this  was  made  the  reason  why 
they  (the  Africans)  r/ere  fiendishly  massacred  in  their  sleep 
by  a  Yankee  mob.  That  outrage  was  barbarous,  it  was 
brutal ;  and  yet  the  perpetrators  of  that  fiendish  massacre 
were  not  even  so  much  as  arrested ;  they  continue  to 
roam  at  large,  unchallenged  by  the  judicial  executive,  as 
if  they  had  its  approval.  This  is  one  of  the  many 
instances  of  the  wrongs  that  are  heaped  upon  the  devoted 
heads  of  the  unhappy  Africans. 

When  honest  Africans  had  been  hired  to  replace  the 
Cumberland  mountaineers,  who  had  given  up  work  in  the 
earlier  part  of  last  year  (1891),  a  party  of  these  moun- 
taineers, well  armed  and  equipped,  marched  to  Tanbark 
Camp  in  the  Cumberland  mountains,  where  the  Africans 
were  at  work,  shot  six  of  them  dead,  and  wounded  ten 
others.  That  is  another  instance  of  the  wrongs  heaped 
upon  our  unhappy  people.  And  what  makes  the  cup  of 
misery  the  more  bitter  and  the  more  galling,  is  the  fact  that 
the  law  takes  no  action  in  a  matter  where  the  African  is 
the  injured  party,  thereby  exposing  itself  to  the  reproach  of 
being  an  abettor  of  criminals  and  evil-doers. 

With  all  these  proofs  before  him,  there  is  surely  no 
man,  unless  he  be  an  inveterate  African-hater,  like  James 
Anthony  Froude,   who  is  evidently  suffering  from  negro- 


I70  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

phobia  ;  or  unless  he  be  a  dullard,  and  not  in  full  possession 
of  his  reasoning  faculties,  who  will  hesitate  to  admit  that 
the  Africans  were,  and  are  to-day,  a  cruelly  wronged  people. 
No,  not  even  Laird  Clowes  will  dare  to  deny  that  the 
Africans  were,  and  are,  a  wronged  people ;  for  his  book 
'  Black  America '  is,  from  beginning  to  end,  replete  with 
evidences  of  that  fact. 

Would  Caucasian  nations  have  needed  to  grant  Africans 
Enfranchisement  if  they  had  not  been  a  wronged  people 
when  in  bondage  ?  We  Africans  owe  our  Emancipation  to 
the  sympathies  of  the  noble  members  of  the  great  Caucasian 
nations  throughout  the  world,  to  the  force  of  Caucasian 
public  opinion,  to  the  will  of  the  sympathetic  and  sovereign 
people;  but  we  owe  nothing  to  hard-hearted  Caucasian 
Governments  ;  the  Governments  have  simply  been  forced 
to  do  what  the  people  willed. 

The  Boston  Herald  says  that  '  perhaps  the  fact  that  the 
Africans  have  always  regarded  themselves  as  a  wronged 
l)eople  impels  them  to  cultivate  a  revengeful  spirit.'  The 
first  part  of  this  sentence  we  have  dealt  with  ;  now  the  latter 
part  of  it  claims  our  attention.  If  the  allegation  that 
some  of  the  American  Africans  'cultivate  a  revengeful  spirit' 
be  true,  then  we  certainly  condemn  the  cherishing  of  such 
a  spirit.  All  good  and  true  Christians  abhor  those  who 
'cultivate  a  revengeful  spirit.'  Yet  if  any  Yankee  has,  or 
ever  will  have,  cause  to  dread  the  vengeance  of  the  African, 
he  will  only  have  himself  to  blame.  The  white  man 
brought  the  black  man  against  his  will  to  America ;  and  if 
the  white  man,  with  part  of  the  money  which  he  has 
amassed  at  the  expense  of  the  tears  and  groans  of  the  black 
man  in  the  days  of  slavery,  will  not  send  the  black  man 
away  back  to  Africa,  will  continue  to  force  him  to  remain 
in  the  United  States,  and  will  continue  to  oppress  him 
there ;  then,  if  the  black  man  should  ever  rise  against  his 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.   171 

oppressors,  the  Yankee  will  have  only  himself  to  blame. 
He  who  '  sows  the  wind  '  must  not  wonder  if,  one  day,  he 
has  to  'reap  the  whirlwind.' 

How  many  people  are  there,  nowadays,  who  do  not 
believe  that  revenge  is  literally  a  feast  for  the  gods  !  The 
good  old  maxim,  'An  eye  for  an  eye,  a  tooth  for  a 
tooth,'  is  still  carried  out  in  its  entirety,  in  spite  of  the 
fact  that  those  who  do  believe  in  retaliation  are  avowed 
Christians,  and  stand  in  the  front  rank  of  modern 
nations. 

The  French,  because  their  arms  were  shattered  in  the 
Seven  Years'  War,  and  they  were  humiliated  by  the  Treaty 
of  Paris,  which  brought  the  war  to  a  close,  and  deprived 
France  of  Canada,  Nova  Scotia,  Cape  Breton,  Senegal, 
Dominica,  St.  Vincent,  and  Tobago,  took  their  revenge 
when  the  American  Colonists  unfurled  the  standard  of 
Independence ;  they  threw  their  lot  into  the  scale  against 
the  Britishers,  and  spent  their  treasure  and  ammunition, 
and  even  their  blood,  on  behalf  of  the  Colonists. 

The  Spaniards,  because  Havanna,  Manilla,  and  much 
treasure  and  some  ships  were  wrested  from  their  grasp 
by  plucky  Britishers,  in  a  spirit  of  revenge,  joined  the 
French  against  them,  when  the  Britishers  were  warring  with 
their  American  Colonists. 

We  may  mention  here,  also,  that  when  the  Federal 
Republicans  of  the  North  crushed  the  Democrat  Con- 
federates of  the  South,  they  did  not  hang  Jefferson  Davis, 
the  whilom  President  of  the  Southern  Confederacy;  they 
did  not  hang  Robert  E.  Lee,  the  whilom  commander-in- 
chief  of  the  same  Confederacy ;  but  after  the  Irish 
Rebellion  of  '98  was  nipped  in  the  bud  at  Vinegar  Hill, 
the  Englishmen  barbarously  butchered  their  own  Irish 
countrymen,  slew  the  noble  and  brave  Lord  Edward  Fitz- 
gerald and  hanged  gallant  Robert  Emmett  and  Wolfe  Tone 


172  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

and  others  in  revenge,  because  they  dared  to  battle  for 
independence.  The  victorious  Englishmen  did  not  show 
the  mercy  to  their  vanquished  Irish  countrymen  which  the 
victorious  Republicans  of  the  North  showed  towards  the 
vanquished  South.  And  to-day,  though  Irishmen  fight 
shoulder  to  shoulder  with  Englishmen,  both  by  land  and  by 
sea,  and  even  fought  in  the  memorable  battle  of  Waterloo, 
where  the  British  commander-in-chief  was  an  Irishman,  the 
best  of  feelings  cannot  be  said  to  exist  between  the  majority 
of  Irishmen  and  the  ruling  English.  The  barbarities  per- 
petrated by  Englishmen  after  Vinegar  Hill  have  left  an 
open  sore  in  the  breasts  of  the  majority  of  Irish  people.  A 
rankling  feeling,  a  feeling  of  animosity,  still  sadly  exists. 
The  majority  of  Irishmen  in  Ireland  sing  not  '  God  save 
the  Queen  !'  but  the  bold  and  defiant  refrains  of  '  God 
save  Ireland  !'  and  'The  Wearing  of  the  Green.'  Because 
of  Vinegar  Hill,  and  the  atrocities  attendant  on  that  battle, 
the  friendship  of  the  United  States  of  North  America 
towards  England  is  not  as  warm  as  it  ought  to  be,  because 
Irishmen,  more  or  less,  dominate  the  feeling  and  policy  of  the 
United  States,  and  the  Irish  Americans  have  not  forgotten 
how  Englishmen  butchered  Irishmen  during  and  after  the 
Rebellion.  It  is  truly  said  that  '  blood  is  thicker  than  water.' 
Ireland  has  been,  and  for  a  long  time  shall  be^  the 
'  Achilles-heel  of  England.'  Who  has  not  heard  of  the 
Clan-na-Gael,  an  association  of  Irishmen  which  originated, 
and  still  exists,  in  America  ?  Who  of  the  Fenian  Brother- 
hood ?  Boyd's  third  edition  of  'Wheaton's  International 
Law,'  pp.  586,  587,  teaches  us  that  'England  has  on  several 
occasions  received  annoyance  from  the  formation  of  hostile 
Irish  organizations  in  America.  The  first  society  for  this 
purpose  appeared  in  1848,  and  was  styled  the  "Irish 
Republican  Union."  ....  This  was  succeeded  in  1855  by 
another,  named   "The  Massachusetts  Irish  Emigrant  Aid 


I 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  173 

Society,"  whose  chief  function  appears  to  have  been  the 
establishment  of  secret  societies  in  various  parts  of  the 
States.  But  both  the  head  society  and  its  secret  branches 
remained  in  obscurity  and  insignificance  until  1863,  when 
they  came  forth  at  Chicago  as  "The  Fenian  Brotherhood." 
At  the  second  congress  of  the  Brotherhood,  in  1865,  the 
President  of  the  society  declared  that  they  were  "virtually 
at  war  "  with  England ;  and,  to  give  a  greater  air  of  reality 
to  this  announcement,  bonds  were  issued,  "  redeemable  six 
months  after  the  acknowledgment  of  the  independence  of 
the  Irish  nation,"  the  bonds  being  payable  "on  presenta- 
tion at  the  treasury  of  the  Irish  Republic."  ....  About  this 
time  the  Canadian  Government  called  out  a  few  companies 
of  militia  to  resist  the  threatened  invasion  of  Canada  by 
the  Fenians,  and  if  the  language  of  the  Brotherhood  de- 
served any  attention,  precautions  were  highly  necessary. 
Colonel  Roberts,  one  of  the  ringleaders,  promised  "  to  have 
the  green  flag  supported  by  the  greatest  army  of  Irishmen 
upon  which  the  sun  ever  shone."  General  Sweeney  talked 
of  the  large  amount  of  arms  and  war  material  they  had 
purchased,  and  threw  out  mysterious  hints  respecting  a 
certain  territory  they  were  about  to  conquer,  "  from  which 
we  can  not  only  emancipate  Ireland,  but  also  annihilate 
England."  These  and  other  threats  were  announced  at 
public  meetings,  and  though  the  project  was  absurd  on  the 
face  of  it,  it  was  nevertheless  a  hostile  organization  against 
a  State  at  peace  with  the  Union.  Matters  became  more 
serious  towards  the  middle  of  the  year.  About  800  or  900 
armed  men  actually  crossed  into  Canada,  and  drove  back 
a  small  number  of  volunteers.  They  retreated  before 
another  Canadian  detachment,  and  on  recrossing  the  frontier 
were  arrested  and  disarmed  by  the  United  States  forces. 
About  sixty-five  were  made  prisoners  in  Canada,  and  placed 
in  the  common  gaol.     The  most  remarkable  event  in  con- 


174  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

nection  with  this  raid  was  that,  on  the  23rd  July,  the  House 
of  Representatives  resolved  to  "request  the  President  of 
the  United  States  to  urge  upon  the  Canadian  authorities, 
and  also  the  British  Government,  the  release  of  the  Fenian 
prisoners  recently  captured  in  Canada,"  and,  further,  that 
the  prosecutions  against  those  taken  in  America  should  be 
abandoned.  In  pursuance  of  this,  the  prosecutions  against 
them  were  dropped  in  America,  and  some  of  the  ringleaders 
released,  after  a  day's  detention,  in  bonds  of  $5,000.  In 
October,  ihe  Government  decided  to  return  some  of  the 
arms  taken  from  the  Fenians,  and  the  remainder  were  re- 
turned the  following  year.  In  November,  1868,  the  Fenian 
leader,  O'Neill,  marched  in  review  through  Philadelphia 
with  three  regiments  in  Fenian  uniform,  numbering,  as  re- 
ported, 3,000  men.  In  1870  two  expeditions  crossed  into 
Canada,  but  being  repulsed,  fled  across  the  frontier,  and 
were  again  disarmed,  and  their  leaders  imprisoned  by  the 
Union  troops.  Some  of  the  leaders  were  fined  and  im- 
prisoned, but  were  released  two  or  three  months  after.' 

Did  not  the  Honourable  Member  for  North  Roscommon, 
Mr.  James  J.  O'Kelly,  in  the  early  eighties,  'go  to  the 
Soudan  for  the  purpose  of  joining  the  Mahdi's  troops'* 
and  measuring  arms  with  the  'brutal  Saxons'? 

Because  Sir  Henry  Arthur  Blake,  K.C.M.G.,  now 
Governor  of  Jamaica,  in  January,  1882,  was  'one  of  the 
five  special  resident  magistrates  selected  by  Government 
to  concert  and  carry  out  measures  for  the  pacification  of  a 
large  portion  of  Ireland,'  on  his  nomination  to  the  governor- 
ship of  Queensland,  in  November,  1888,  by  Downing  Castle, 
the  Queenslanders,  principally  Irishmen,  laid  their  veto  on 
it,  and  'Coercionist'  Lord  Knutsford  was,  with  humiliation, 
forced  to  give  in  to  the  Queenslanders. 

Because  ex-President  Stephen   Grover  Cleveland,  when 

*  '  Men  and  Women  of  the  Time  for  1891,'  p.  677. 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.  175 

in  office,  was  suspected  of  being  favourable  towards  Great 
Britain,  he  was  beaten  at  the  National  Political  Campaign 
of  1888,  mainly  through  the  preponderance  of  the  Irish 
electoral  votes,  which  went  solid  for  his  rival,  Republican 
Benjamin  Harrison ;  and,  in  revenge,  no  doubt,  Democrat 
Cleveland  gave  British  Ambassador  Lord  Sackville,  on  the 
30th  of  October,  1888,  '  the  sack  '  and  his  passport. 

That  '  burning,'  debateable,  and,  we  may  say,  everlasting 
question  of  the  Behring  Sea,  is  now  on  the  tapis.  Let  the 
Republicans  yield  an  inch  to  Britain,  and  the  Irish  votes 
will  go  solid  for  the  Democrats  !  Erin — yes,  Erin  ! — is  the 
*  Achilles-heel '  of  Albion,  and  holds  the  fort  in  the  United 
States  and  in  the  United  Kingdom  ! 

The  British,  because  the  Spaniards  made  war  on  them 
while  they  were  engaged  in  fratricidal  conflict  with  their 
rebellious  kinsmen  in  America,  in  revenge  assisted  the 
Spanish-American  Colonies  in  every  possible  way,  con- 
sistent with  economy,  when  they  were  struggling  to  throw 
off  the  galling  yoke  of  Spain.  The  same  Britishers,  because 
Frenchmen  helped  America  to  gain  her  independence, 
when  Hayti  rose  against  the  French  and  drove  them  into 
the  sea,  revenged  themselves  on  Frenchmen  by  giving  the 
Haytians  their  sympathy  and  countenance,  which  excited 
the  exceeding  wrath  of  Frenchmen. 

When  the  Yankees,  not  many  months  ago,  rushed  on  to 
the  shameful  massacre  of  the  Sioux  Indian  chief,  Sitting 
Bull,  and  his  ghost-dancing  warriors,  what  was  their  war- 
cry?  Was  it  not  the  revengeful  slogan  of  'Remember 
Custer!'  ?  And  the  reason  why  the  Yankees  did  rush  on  to 
the  massacre  of  the  inadequately  armed  Sioux  Indians  with 
the  revengeful  slogan  of  '  Remember  Custer !'  was  this  : 
General  Custer  met  his  death,  many  years  ago,  in  battle 
with  these  very  Sioux  Indians,  who  successfully  resisted  him 
when  he  had  ridden  with  his  Yankee  soldiers  to  effect  the 


176  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

extermination  of  the  ghost-dancing  warriors  of  Sitting  Bull. 
When,  between  the  latter  part  of  the  year  1890  and  the 
earlier  part  of  last  (1891)  year,  the  Yankees  marched 
against  the  Red  Americans,  their  *  prevailing  sentiment 
was  revenge';  they  showed  how  'implacable'  are  'their 
hatreds.'  Again,  Frenchmen,  though  they  have  always  been 
in  the  front. rank  of  civilization,  and  are  professed  Chris- 
tians, nevertheless  maintain  the  Revanche  spirit  towards  the 
Germans.  How  the  warlike  Gaul  is  burning  to  wrest  Alsace- 
Lorraine  from  the  grasp  of  the  not  less  warlike  Teuton  is 
matter  of  common  knowledge  !  Frenchmen  are  leaving  no 
stone  unturned  in  their  supreme  effort  to  carry  out  success- 
fully a  Reva7iche  war  with  the  Teutons.  They  are  trying 
their  '  level  best,'  they  are  straining  every  nerve,  to  secure 
the  alliance  of  Russia,  and  the  co-operation  of  the  Muscovite 
hordes  of  the  White  Czar,  against  the  Germans,  Austrians, 
and  Italians  in  the  war  that  cannot  be  very  long  delayed. 

But  to  return  to  superstition.  The  Boston  Herald  does 
not  seem  to  be  aware  of  the  fact  that  there  was,  and  that 
there  is,  superstition  amongst  the  whites  in  America,  even 
in  '  Puritan  New  England.' 

In  the  olden  days,  how  many  old  women,  victims  of 
gross  superstition,  and  narrow-minded,  sour-faced  '  Puritan 
New  Englanders,'  were  bound  to,  and  perished  at,  the  stake 
on  the  charge  of  being  witches !  The  '  Puritan  New 
Englander '  to-day  is  as  superstitious  as  his  ancestors 
were  who  went  before  him.* 

Laird  Clowes  brings  his  reference  to  African  superstition 
to  a  close  with  these  words  :  '  I  may  add  that,  not  perhaps 
at  Boston,  but  certainly  in  the  South,  and  especially  in 
Louisiana,  Voodooism  exists  to-day.' 

•^  See  D.  G.  Brinton's  '  Myths  of  the  New  World '  ;  Ban- 
croft's '  History  of  the  Colonization  of  the  United  States,' 
vol.  iii. ;  Hutchinson's  'History  of  Massachusetts  Bay.' 


HI 


TERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTURY.    177 

Granted  that  the  so-called  '  Voodooism,'  or,  more"  pro- 
perly, a  harmless  superstition,  does  exist  in  the  Southern 
States  of  America  amongst  a  very  few  of  the  illiterate 
American  Africans,  others  of  the  African  race,  who  know 
better  than  to  be  superstitious,  have  an  apology  forth- 
coming for  those  of  their  race  who  may  be  superstitious. 
It  must  be  remembered  that  the  American  African  received 
his  freedom  only  on  January  i,  1863 — that  is,  but  twenty- 
nine  years  ago.  His  civilization  and  Christianity  began 
only  with  Emancipation,  not  in  any  proper  sense  before  : 
those  of  the  American  Africans  who  may  to-day  be  super- 
stitious can  only  be  a  few  ignorant  men  and  women  from 
among  those  Africans  who  actually  experienced  the  yoke  of 
servitude.  The  American  whites  are  really  responsible  for 
any  forms  of  superstition  that  may  still  lurk  among  a 
handful  of  Africans  in  America,  because  there  was  neither 
civilization  nor  Christianity  for  the  African  under  the 
Slavery  regime  in  the  United  States.  It  is  Emancipation 
that  has  poured  into  the  lap  of  the  African  Civilization 
and  Christianity ;  and  these  powerful  forces  cause  the 
African  to  seek  after  knowledge,  and  make  great  progress 
in  Education.  The  Superstitions  which  the  ancestors  of 
every  people  have  had  amongst  them  disappear  before 
Education,  even  as  the  chaff  drives  before  the  wind. 

But  does  not  Mr.  Clowes  himself  tell  us  (on  page  116  of 
his  '  Black  America  ')  that  '  educationally  the  coloured  man 
has  undoubtedly  made  great  progress  since  his  emancipation? 
In  the  slavery  days  ignorance  was  imposed  by  law  upon 
the  slave.'  He  says  that  the  American  African  is  super- 
stitious ;  but  he  also  tells  us  that,  educationally,  the  African 
has  undoubtedly  made  great  progress  since  his  glorious 
emancipation.  And  we  fully  believe  that  the  superstition 
which  does  at  all  exist  amongst  the  African  Yankees  will 
flee  from  their  midst  altogether,  through  the  great  and  rapid 

12 


178  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

progress  which  the  Yankee  Africans  are  making  in  educa- 
tion and  civih'zation. 

With  a  few  more  words  we  conclude  this  chapter. 

Though  the  Roman  Emperor  Claudius  and  his  lieu- 
tenants, Aulus  Plautius  and  Vespasian,  brought  Civilization 
with  the  Roman  soldiers  into  Britain  ;*  though  Fagan  and 
Dervan,  in  the  second  century,  brought  Christianity  into 
Britain,  it  is  on  record  that  the  Britons  retrograded  and 
relapsed  into  barbarism  and  the  idolatrous  superstitions  and 
practices  of  their  ancestors ;  so  much  so  that,  when  the 
Angles  and  Jutes,  with  the  sovereign  tribe  of  Saxons,  landed 
in  A.D.  449,  England — degenerated  and  demoralized — fell 
an  easy  prey  before  the  onslaught  of  these  marauding 
hordes.f  Matters  continued  in  that  low  state  until  a.d.  596 
o^  597>  when  Benedictine  Austin,  or  Augustine,  brought 
his  forty  tonsured  monks  into  Britain.  These  men  re- 
claimed the  degenerate  Britishers  from  heathendom  and 
superstition.!  We  Africans,  then,  can  always  hopefully 
rejoice,  and  can  find  our  consolation  in  the  fact  that,  if 
there  be  superstition  amongst  our  people — a  people  who 
have  not  yet  had  sixty  years  of  Civilization  and  Christianity 
— (these  beginning  with  the  Emancipation  of  the  British 
African  in  August,  1838,  and  with  the  Emancipation  of  the 
American  African  in  January,  1863),  we  are  not  so  bad  as 
the  Britishers.  Though  the  Britisher  has  had  more  than 
nineteen  centuries  of  Civilization  and  over  seventeen  cen- 
turies of  Christianity,  he  is  still  superstitious ;  and  that  he 
is  so  we  have  proved  by  referring  to  the  writings  of  Sir 
Walter  Scott,  Robert  Burns,  Samuel  Rogers,  and  Charles 
Dickens.  We  have  done  more.  We  have  produced  quota- 
tions from  the  works  of  Thomas  Wright  and  Lowen  Pike, 

*  Lingard,  vol.  i.,  chap,  i.,  pp.  1-68. 
t  Ibid.^  vol.  i.,  chap,  ii.,  pp.  103-105. 
\  Jbid.y  vol.  i.,  chap,  ii.,  pp.  108,  109  et  seq. 


I 


SUPERSTITION  IN  NINETEENTH  CENTUR  Y,    lyc) 

and  from  the  Daily  Telegraphy  the  Stai%  the  Daily  Graphic, 
and  Lloyd's  News^  tending  to  show  that  the  Caucasian  is 
as  superstitious  to-day  as  his  ancestors  were  before  him,  and 
had  better  see  to  the  'beam  in  his  own  eye'  before  he 
shows  himself  to  be  so  vigorous  over  extracting  '  the  mote ' 
of  superstition  oat  of  his  African  brother's  eye."^ 

■^  If  the  reader  would  like  to  have  a  more  extensive  know- 
ledge of  Caucasian  superstition,  we  would  refer  him  to  J.  F. 
Campbell's  'Tales  of  the  Western  Highlands';  J.  Grimm's 
'Teutonic  Mythology';  Sir  George  W.  Cox's  'Introduction  to 
Mythology  and  Folklore';  H.  Long's  'Custom  and  Myth,'  also 
'  Myth,  Ritual  and  Religion' ;  Maclnnes  and  Nutt's  '  Folklore 
and  Hero  Tales  from  Argyleshire ' ;  J.  Brand's  '  Popular  An- 
tiquities';  W.  Gregor's  'Folklore  of  the  North-East  of  Scot- 
land ' ;  J.  Napier's  '  Folklore  of  the  West  of  Scotland ' ;  J.  G. 
Dolzell's  'Darker  Superstitions  of  Scotland,'  'Fireside  Stories 
of  Ireland,'  and  'Legendary  Fictions  of  the  Irish  Celts';  T. 
Crofton  Croker's  'Fairy  Legends  and  Traditions  of  Ireland'; 
G.  L.  Gomme's  '  Manners  and  Customs,  Superstitions  and 
Traditions';  Miss  C.  S.  Burne's  'Shropshire  Folklore';  W. 
Henderson's  'Folklore  of  the  Northern  Counties';  Lowen 
Pike's  'History  of  Crime  in  England,'  vol.  ii.,  pp.  131-139; 
Stephen's  '  History  of  the  Criminal  Law,'  vol.  ii.,  chap.  xxv. ; 
Lecky's  '  History  of  Rationalism  in  Europe,'  vol.  i.,  chap.  i.  ; 
and  last,  not  least,  we  would  advise  him  to  look  up  the 
'Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  ninth  edition,  vol.  ii.,  pp.  'j/^ifCt  seq.j 
vol.  vii.,  pp.  60-64;  293,  294;  vol.  ix.,  pp.  357,  358  ;  vol.  xv., 
pp.  199^/  seq.j  vol.  xvii.,  pp.  135-158;  vol.  xxii.,  pp.  404-407; 
vol.  xxiv.,  pp.  619-623. 


12 


CHAPTER  V. 

UNDER    CAUCASIAN    RULE. 

We  do  not  propose  here  to  dwell  on  the  way  in  which  the 
American  Africans  are  defrauded  of  their  votes  by  their 
white  fellow-citizens,  because  the  facts  are  sufficiently  noto- 
rious. But  we  join  our  protest  with  that  of  Mr.  Clowes, 
who  has  the  courage  to  admit,  in  his  third  chapter  of 
'  Black  America,'  that  the  trickeries  practised  on  them  (the 
American  Africans)  are  infamous,  cruel,  and  shameful. 
Laird  Clowes,  however,  makes  a  great  mistake  when  he 
quotes  Mr.  A.  M.  E.  Church,  of  Vicksburg,  an  American 
African  clergyman,  as  writing  in  the  year  1866  :  'We  will 
say  .  .  .  that  the  mass  of  Negroes  would  do  themselves  and 
their  country  more  good  if  the  ballot  were  out  of  their 
reach.' 

The  clergyman  of  Vicksburg's  mere  statement  of  opinion 
is  of  little  or  no  importance.  Does  not  Mr.  Clowes  know 
that  the  great  majority  of  Irishmen,  the  Nationalists, 
have  been  agitating  for  Home  Rule  during  many  long 
years ;  and,  at  the  same  time,  the  small  minority  of  Irish- 
men, the  Conservative  Orangemen,  have  been  almost 
throughout,  and  they  are  even  now,  persistently  opposing 
their  countrymen  in  the  demand  for  Home  Rule  ? 

Is  it  not  a  known  fact  that,  at  the  present  time  as  in  the 
past,  certain  Irishmen  are  put  up  on  the  floor  of  the  British 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.         •  \%i 

[ouse  of   Commons,    and  elsewhere,  to    denounce  their 
brother  Irishmen  ? 

Do  not  Conservative  and  Liberal  Unionist  Scotsmen  and 
Welshmen  continually  oppose  the  demand  for  Home  Rule 
in  Scotland  and  Wales,  which  is  made  by  their  countrymen, 
the  Gladstonian  Liberal  Scotsmen  and  Welshmen  ? 

When  the  Indian  Hindoos,  not  many  months  ago,  peti- 
tioned the  British  Home  Government  for  a  Constitution, 
did  not  the  Indian  Mahommedans  immediately  afterwards 
send  a  counter-petition  to  the  British  Parliament  against 
the  granting  of  a  Constitution  to  India  ?  We  are  of  opinion, 
then,  that  the  Rev.  A.  M.  E.  Church's  opposition  to  the 
granting  of  the  ballot  and  the -franchise  to  his  American- 
African  countrymen  and  kinsmen  is  on  a  par  with  the 
opposition  manifested  by  the  Irish  Conservative  Orange- 
men, by  the  Conservative  and  Liberal-Unionist  Scotsmen  and 
Welshmen,  to  the  granting  of  Home  Rule  to  Ireland,  Scot- 
land, and  Wales  respectively.  And  this  same  opposition  is 
also  on  a  level  with  that  displayed  by  the  Indian  Mahom- 
medans to  the  conferring  of  a  Constitution  on  India.  Mr. 
Church's  assertion  that  '  the  mass  of  Negroes  would  do 
themselves  and  their  country  more  good  if  the  ballot  were 
out  of  their  reach'  is  nothing  unusual  from  a  political 
point  of  view.  The  clergyman  of  Vicksburg,  however,  ought 
not  to  interfere  in  politics  ;  he  should  stick  to  his  pulpit 
and  to  proper  pulpit  topics.  Mr.  Clowes,  on  page  88 
of  his  book,  has  the  following  excerpt  from  Mr.  James 
Anthony  Froude's  'English  in  the  West  Indies':  'One  do^s 
not  grudge  the  black  man  his  property,  his  freedom,  his 
opportunity  of  advancing  himself;  one  would  wish  him  as 
free  and  prosperous  as  the  fates  and  his  own  exertions  can 
make  him,  with  more  and  more  means  of  raising  himself  to 
the  white  man's  level.  But  left  to  himself,  and  without  the 
white  man  to  lead  him,  he  can  never  reach   it.  .  .  .  We 


1 82  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

have  a  population]  to  deal  with  the  majority  of  whom  are 
of  an  inferior  race.  Inferior  I  am  obliged  to  call  them, 
because,  as  ytt,  they  have  shown  no  capacity  to  rise  above 
the  condition  of  their  ancestors,  except  under  European  laws, 
European  education,  and  European  authority  to  keep  them 
from  war  upon  one  another.  .  .  .  Give  them  independence, 
and  in  a  few  generations  they  will  peel  off  such  civilization 
as  they  have  as  easily  and  as  willingly  as  their  coats  and 
trouser?.' 

The  first  part  of  this  quotation  which  claims  our  notice 
is,  that  the  African,  if  'left  to  himself,  and  without  the 
white  man  to  lead  him,  can  never  reach  it,'  />.,  'the 
white  man's  level.'  That  is  what  Mr.  Froude  and  Mr. 
Clowes  believe  ;  but  their  belief  is  not  soundly  based.  We 
have  proved,  in  our  Second  Chapter,  that  the  Haytian, 
though  left  to  himself,  has  not  only  not  '  retrograded  and 
reverted,'  but  '  has  raised  himself  to  the  white  man's  level ' ; 
and  to  that  chapter  reference  should  be  made.  The 
Liberian  also,  though  left  to  himself,  'has  raised  himself 
to  the  white  man's  level.'  Liberia  is  as  prosperous  to-day 
as  it  m'ght  be  were  it  under  a  white  man's  Government. 
We  will  allow  the  white  man  to  have  his  say  on  this 
subject. 

The  American  Colonization  Society,  writing  in  the 
African  Repository  for  April,  1890,  says:  *The  present 
condition  of  Liberia  is  evidenced  : 

''First. — By  the  increased  agricultural  industry  of  the 
settlers ;  their  extending  cultivation  of  coffee,  cocoa,  and 
sugar,  which  is  placing  them  in  a  condition  not  only  of 
comfort,  but  of  independence. 

'  Second. — By  the  growing  commerce  of  the  Republic, 
which  is  laying  under  cultivation  all  available  products, 
spontaneous  and  cultivated. 

'  Third. — By  the  earnestness  with  which  the  people  are 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  183 

turning  their  attention  to  the  interior,  and  pushing  their 
settlements  and  agricultural  labours  to  the  healthy  and 
fertile  highlands  in  that  direction. 

'•Fourth. — By  the  development  among  the  Aborigines, 
especially  the  Kroo  tribe,  in  imitation  of,  and  through  the 
teaching  of,  the  settlers,  of  the  knowledge  and  practice  of 
civilized  arts,  mechanical  and  agricultural ;  also,  their  in- 
telligence and  their  capital  for  the  conduct  of  foreign  trade. 
They  have  begun  to  ship  their  own  products  directly  to 
Europe,  and  import  thence  merchandise  suited  to  their 
localities. 

^  Fifth. — The  erection  by  the  settlers  of  schools  and 
churches,  by  their  own  means,  for  the  benefit  of  themselves 
and  the  Aborigines,  without  any  prompting  or  pecuniary 
aid  from  the  United  States.  Chief  among  the  educational 
agencies  recently  established  by  the  Liberians,  is  the  Ricke's 
Institute,  founded  by  the  liberality  of  a  Negro  immigrant 
from  Virginia,  and  supported  by  the  Baptists,  with  no  aid 
from  America.  It  is  conducted  by  three  ministers,  one 
educated  at  Liberia  College  ;  one  at  Shaw  University, 
Raleigh,  N.C. ;  and  the  other  brought  up  in  Liberia,  with- 
out any  special  school-training.  A  Mahommedan  convert, 
from  the  interior,  has  been  employed  to  teach  Arabic  and 
the  vernacular  languages.' 

The  Liberians  are  more  than  ever  awake  to  their  privi- 
leges and  duties  on  that  Continent.  Their  influence  upon 
the  natives  is  everywhere  increasing ;  and  instead  of  the 
settlers  relapsing  into  barbarism,  as  it  is  sometimes  asserted, 
they  are  making  effective  inroads  upon  the  physical,  in- 
tellectual, and  moral  wilderness. 

The  re-captive  Congoes,  who  were  captured  in  slave- 
ships  by  United  States  men-of-war  and  landed  in  Liberia 
thirty  years  ago,  have  learned  the  arts  of  civilization,  em- 
braced  Christianity,  and  become  capable  citizens,   filling 


1 84  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

important  offices  in  the  Republic.  Some  of  these  people 
have  been  recently  introduced  into  the  Congo  Free  State, 
under  the  auspices  of  the  authorities  there,  as  elements  of 
civilization,  owing  to  their  knowledge  of  agriculture  and 
the  trades.' 

The  American  Colonization  Society  goes  further  in  its 
eulogy  of  Liberia  and  the  Liberians,  and  writes  in  the 
African  Reposito?y  for  April,  1891,  that  'The  action  of 
the  Legislature  of  Liberia,  at  its  last  session,  regarding 
foreign  affairs,  was  greatly  in  advance  of  anything  in  the 
past. 

'  The  grant  to  an  English  company  of  the  sole  right  to 
collect,  manufacture,  and  export  India-rubber,  in  and  from 
that  Republic,  promises  greatly  to  promote  its  industrial 
and  financial  interests.  For  this  monopoly,  ;^2o,ooo 
sterling,  as  a  first  instalment,  was  received  on  the  12th  of 
June  by  the  Government  at  Monrovia. 

'The  legislature  has  also  granted  to  the  same  company 
the  right  to  establish  a  bank  under  charter  from  the  Govern- 
ment, and  to  construct  telegraphs  and  one  or  more  railroads 
from  the  coast  to  the  interior. 

'The  educational  advantages  of  the  Republic  are  in- 
creasing. The  Methodist  Episcopal  Seminary  at  Monrovia 
has  been  reopened,  and  the  Episcopalians  have  not  only 
enlarged  their  school  facilities  at  Cape  Palmas  and  at  Cape 
Mount,  but  they  are  preparing  to  open  a  boarding-school  on 
the  St.  Paul's  river.  The  Ricke's  Institute,  an  indigenous 
school  established  by  the  Baptists,  is  growing  in  influence 
and  importance.  It  now  contains  over  forty  pupils,  some  of 
whom  are  Aborigines,  mostly  of  the  Bassa  tribe. 

'  The  facts  are  that  the  Government  of  Liberia  attracts 
the  social,  commercial,  and  poHtical  economy  of  several 
millions  of  Africans,  that  for  leagues  about  its  settlements 
the  kings  and  chiefs  are  friendly  and  even  subordinate,  and 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  185 

that  its  people  have  advanced  in  civilization  and  are  success- 
fully working  out  their  destiny  according  to  nineteenth 
century  lights.' 

No  one  out  of  Liberia  is  better  qualified  to  speak  of  the 
condition  of  the  Liberians  than  the  American  Colonization 
Society,  and  that  society  in  every  way  testifies  to  the  fact 
that  the  Liberian — an  African — '  has  raised  himself  to  the 
white  man's  level  .  .  .  without  the  white  man  to  lead  him.' 
For  it  further  says  that  the  '  Liberian  people  have  advanced 
in  civilization,  and  are  successfully  working  out  their  destiny 
according  to  nineteenth  century  lights.'  And  yet,  with  all 
this  progress  standing  to  her  credit,  Liberia  is  (June,  1891) 
hardly  forty-four  years  old  as  an  independent  Country. 

Mr.  Clowes  quotes  Mr.  Froude  as  saying  :  '  We  have  a 
population  to  deal  with  the  majority  of  whom  are  an 
inferior  race.  Inferior  I  am  obliged  to  call  them,  because 
as  yet  they  have  shown  no  capacity  to  rise  above  the  con- 
dition of  their  ancestors,  except  under  European  laws, 
European  education,  and  European  authority  to  keep 
them  from  war  upon  one  another.  .  .  .  Give  them  inde- 
pendence, and  in  a  few  generations  they  will  peel  off  such 
civilization  as  they  have  as  easily  as  their  coats  and 
trousers.' 

We  have  shown,  in  the  case  of  Liberia  in  this  chapter, 
and  in  the  case  of  Hayti  in  the  second  chapter,  that  the 
African  is  not  an  inferior  race,  and  that  far  from  the  inde- 
pendent African  '  retrograding  and  reverting,'  or  *  peeling 
off  such  civilization  as  he  has,'  he  is,  in  the  words  of  the 
Caucasian  Yankee,  'advancing  in  civilization,  and  is  success- 
fully working  out  his  destiny  according  to  nineteenth  century 
lights.' 

We  must  say  a  few  words,  however,  in  answer  to  Mr. 
Froude's  statement  that  the  Africans  'as  yet  have  shown  no 
capacity   to   rise    above   the   condition  of  their  ancestors, 


i86  THE  LONE^STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

except  under  European  laws,  European  education,  and 
European  authority  to  keep  them  from  war  upon  one 
another.  .  .  .' 

Are  the  Independent  People  of  Liberia  waging  war  upon 
one  another?"^  Is  Hayti  not  at  the  present  moment  (June, 
1891)  quite  peaceful  and  quiet  ?t  And  are  the  Liberians 
and  the  Haytians  each  living  'under  Eurojean  laws,  Euro- 
pean education,  and  European  authority,'  as  Mr.  Froude 
says  they  must  do  in  order  to  keep  from  war  ? 

But  we  have  to  ask  this  question  :  Did  the  Briton  show 
any  capacity  to  rise  above  the  condition  of  his  ancestors, 
and  keep  himself  from  warring  upon  his  brother  Briton, 
before  the  arrival  of  the  Roman  and  his  legions  ?  Was  it 
not  Roman  laws,  Roman  education,  and  Roman  authority 
that  kept  the  Britons  from  waging  fierce  war  upon  one 
another  ? 

When  the  Roman  eagle  took  its  final  departure  at  the 
head  of  the  Roman  legions,  in  a.d.  426,  leaving  Inde- 
pendence in  the  lap  of  the  Britons,  how  did  the  Britons 
behave  themselves  ?  Did  they  not  wage  even  fierce  and 
unnatural  war  upon  one  another  ?  Did  not  the  partisans 
of  Ambrosius  and  Vortigern  cleave  each  other's  skulls,  and 
even  drink  each  other's  blood,  and  eat  each  other's  flesh, 
like  so  many  cannibals  ?  The  independent  Britons,  deprived 
of  Roman  laws,  education,  and  authority,  degenerated,  and 
fell  to  slitting  each  other's  throats ;  and,  as  division  is  always 
a  source  of  weakness,  the  Pict-Scot  savage  was  successful 
in  his  attacks  upon  them.  The  spear  of  the  Saxons,  Jutes, 
and  Angles  restored  peace  to  the  Britons  for  a  time  ;  but 

■^  The  Chief  Magistrate  of  Liberia,  His  Excellency  J.  J. 
Cheeseman,  is  a  national^  not  a  party,  President,  having  been 
elected  by  the  unanimous  voice  of  his  countrymen. 

f  The  same  remark  may  be  applied  to  General  L.  M.  Fk. 
Hippolyte,  President  of  Hayti. 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  187 

then  these  Saxons  (as  the  combined  Saxons,  Angles,  Jutes, 
and  Britons  were  called)  fell  to  fighting  amongst  themselves, 
until  the  Danes,  or  Norsemen,  succeeded  in  keeping  them 
quiet.  The  Normans,  in  their  turn,  failed  to  keep  England 
peaceful,  for  civil  war  broke  out  in  the  reign  of  the  Red 
King,  and  there  were  civil  wars  in  the  reigns  of  Henry  I., 
Stephen,  Henry  II.,  John,  Henry  HI.,  Edward  II., 
Richard  II.,  Henry  IV.  One  would  think  that  Mr.  Froude 
and  Mr.  Clowes  have  never  heard  of  Jack  Cade's  Rebellion 
and  Seven  Oaks.  Are  not  the  Twelve  Battles  fought  during 
the  Civil  Wars  of  the  Roses  a  matter  of  well-known 
history  ? 

The  reigns  of  Henry  VII.,  Henry  VIII.,  Edward  VI., 
Mary  L,  Elizabeth,  and  James  I.,  each  experienced  civil 
war.  Twenty  Battles  were  fought  in  the  Civil  War  between 
Charles  I.  and  the  Parliamentarians,  when  Cavaliers  and 
Roundheaded  Puritans  smote  each  other,  the  last,  the 
decisive  battle,  handing  Charles  over  to  his  subjects,  who 
subsequently  beheaded  him. 

We  have  mentioned  civil  wars  in  England,  but  the  sister 
kingdoms  of  Ireland  and  Scotland  were  each  also  subjected 
to  the  baneful  influence  of  civil  war.  The  children  of  Cale- 
donia, '  stern  and  wild,'  and  the  children  of  unhappy  and 
distracted  Erin,  were  almost  continually  levying  w^ar  upon 
one  another. 

The  British  people  had  civil  wars  under  Charles  IL, 
James  II.,  William  III.  and  Mary  II. ,  George  I.,  and 
George  II.  In  brief,  it  was  only  the  battle  of  Vinegar 
Hill,  fought  in  1798,  in  the  reign  of  the  Third  George,  that 
put  an  end  to  Civil  War  amongst  the  British  people.  At 
Vinegar  Hill  Englishmen  and  Scotsmen  were  marshalled  in 
battle  array  against  their  Irish  countrymen,  whom  they  then 
defeated.  That  conflict  put  an  end  to  the  story  of  fratricidal 
strife  in  Great  Britain.    From  the  time  of  that  battle,  fought 


i88  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

in  1798,  to  the  present  time  Britain  has  enjoyed  only  ninety- 
three  years  of  freedom  from  fratricidal  war. 

It  required  Roman  laws,  Roman  education,  and  Roman 
authority  to  keep  the  Gauls  from  war  upon  one  another. 
The  Romans  civilized  the  Gauls  ;  and,  when  the  time- 
honoured  but  then  effeminate  Roman  Empire  was  tottering 
and  crumbling  to  pieces,  after  its  long  career  of  dominion 
and  glory,  the  conquering  Franks  poured  their  irresistible 
legions  from  Germany  into  the  heart  of  the  Gallic  country, 
gave  the  death-blow  to  the  Empire  of  the  countrymen  of 
Caesar  and  Cicero,  brought  Roman  Gaul  into  subjection, 
gave  their  name  to  the  country,  and  imposed  Frankish  laws, 
Frankish  education,  and  Frankish  authority  on  the  necks 
of  their  subjects.  But  France,  too,  has  had  a  long  career 
of  fratricidal  strifes,  the  last  civil  war  amongst  Frenchmen, 
that  between  the  Government  and  its  adherents  and  the 
Social-Commune,  only  terminating  in  187 1,  after  the  troops 
of  Marshal  Duke  MacMahon  of  Magenta  had  marched  to 
the  slaughter  of  those  of  Eudes,  Duval,  Cluseret,  Bergeret, 
Wetzel,  Onolowitz,  Dombrowski,  Wroblowski,  Cecilia,  and 
sundry  other  '  Generals '  of  the  Reds. 

Would  Germany  be  now  one  of  the  leading  countries  of 
the  world  if  it  had  not  had  the  beneficial  effects  of  Roman 
civilization  and  Roman  supervision  ?  Yet  Germany  has  had 
a  long  spell  of  civil  wars,  for  there  was  a  time  when  Teuton 
smote  brother-Teuton,  as  arrayed  against  each  other  in  the 
field. 

The  last  Civil  War  in  Germany  ended  at  the  decisive 
battle  of  Koniggratz,4  or  Sadowa,  on  July  3,  1866,  when 
Protestant  and  Hohenzollern  Prussia,  under  Prince  Frede- 
rick Charles,  humiliated  Catholic  and  Hapsburg  Austria, 
under  General  Benedek,  thereby  giving  the  deathblow  to 
the  Germanic  Confederation  of  18 15,  and  laying  the 
foundation  of  United  Germany  under  the  headship  of  the 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  189 

Brandenburg  conqueror,  while  mortified  and  crestfallen 
Austria  was  forced  to  consent  to  pay  a  war  indemnity  of 
20,000  thalers,  recognise  the  severance  of  the  erewhile 
Germanic  Confederation,  and  consent  to  a  new  formation 
of  Germany  in  which  she  should  bear  no  part ;  and  to 
complete  her  cup  of  sorrow,  the  Fatherland  of  Franz  Josef 
was  forced  to  resign  all  claims  to  Schleswig-Holstein,  for 
which  she  had  fought  and  bled,  in  conjunction  with  the 
Hohenzollern,  in  the  Danish  campaign  of  1864,  in  favour 
of  Prussia,  and  to  behold  with  streaming  eyes,  and  bleeding 
from  many  wounds,  Hanovei,  Hesse-Cassel,  Hesse-Nassau 
and  Frankfort  pounced  upon  as  spoils  of  war,  and  in  the  pride 
of  victory,  by  her  successful  rival,  the  eagle  of  Hohenzollern. 
Austria-Hungary  has  also  had  her  civil  wars ;  the  last  ter- 
minating in  1848,  during  which  Austria  and  Hungary  were 
arrayed  against  each  other.  Russia,  Italy,  and  Turkey  have 
each  had  their  civil  wars.  Denmark,  Norway,  and  Sweden, 
and  Holland  have  also  had  their  civil  wars.  The  Spaniards 
never  would  have  been  able  to  rise  above  the  condition  of 
their  ancestors  except  under  Roman  laws,  Roman  education, 
and  Roman  authority.  The  Visigoths,  who  gave  the  finish- 
ing blow  to  the  moribund  Roman  Empire  in  Spain,  con- 
tinued the  work  of  civilization  which  the  Romans  had 
begun,  but  did  the  Visigoths  and  their  subjects  refrain  from 
tearing  one  another  to  pieces  ?  When  the  Moors  (/>.,  the 
descendants  of  Asiatics  and  Africans)  landed  in  the  dawn 
of  the  eighth  century,  they  were  able,  within  the  short  space 
of  less  than  three  years,  to  thoroughly  subdue  the  divided 
and  faction-torn  Iberian  Peninsula,  and  impose  their  yoke 
upon  the  necks  of  the  Spaniards.  Nor  did  the  Moors  quit 
Spain  till  the  seventeenth  century.  The  story  of  Portugal 
is  almost  identical  with  that  of  Spain.* 

■^  The  last  Civil  and  Carlist  War  in  Spain  terminated  only  in 
1876,  for  which  vide  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  xxii.,  p.  346. 


I90  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

The  dying  Roman  Empire,  which  had  introduced  civiliza- 
tion into  Lusitania,  being  weak  and  fc;eble,  easily  yielded  to 
the  onslaught  of  the  warlike  Moors  after  these  latter  had 
fairly  overrun  Spain.  But  when  the  Moors  were  unfortu- 
nately divided  amongst  themselves,  and  were  warring  upon 
one  another,  the  Visigoths  were  able  to  reduce  them  into 
complete  subjection,  and  Portugal  became  their  prize. 

It  was  Roman  laws  and  Roman  authority  that  raised  the 
Switzer  from  the  condition  of  a  savage  to  that  of  a  civiUzed 
being.  The  Austro-Germans,  and  afterwards  Frenchmen, 
continued  to  carry  out  the  work  of  civilization  which  the 
Roman  had  begun  in  Switzerland,  and  they  helped  to  make 
the  Swiss  what  they  are  at  the  present  day.  Yet  the 
Switzer  has  had  civil  wars  in  his  country  and  amongst  his 
countrymen.  It  was  but  recently  that  Switzerland  treated 
the  world  to  an  exhibition  of  civil  war  on  a  small  scale  in 
the  Ticino  Rebellion.  The  Hellenes,  or  Greeks,  after  con- 
quering the  aboriginal  inhabitants  of  Hellas,  imposed,  with 
their  yoke,  their  civilization  and  institutions  on  the  pliant 
necks  of  the  Pelasgians,  while  they  gave  their  name  to  the 
country  and  its  inhabitants. 

Greece  was,  indeed,  the  home  of  literature  and  the  arts ; 
her  civilization,  already  at  a  high  standard,  receiving  a 
greater  impetus  when  it  came  into  contact  with  the  civiliza- 
tion of  the  Romans,  when  the  rule  of  the  countrymen  of 
Caesar  and  Cicero  was  supreme  at  Athens.  The  reastm 
why  the  Greeks  fell  such  an  easy  prey  to  the  omnipotent 
Romans  was  their  being  divided  among  themselves,  and 
carrying  on  war  upon  one  another. 

The  Turks,  too,  who  put  an  end  to  the  tottering  Graeco- 
Latin  Empire,  which  had  succeeded  that  of  the  purely- 
Rornan-Latin  in  Greece,  contributed  to  the  advancement 
and  progress  of  the  Greeks  until  Navarino  and  Greek 
Independence  died  away  with  the  rule  of  the  Osmanlis. 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE. 

But  what  two  nations  are  there  that  can  boast  of  in- 
digenous civilization?  The  civiUzation  of  every  nation, 
ahnost  without  exception,  has  been  imported.  What  country- 
is  there  which  has  never  known  any  civil  wars  ? 

Civil  war  has  shown  its  many  hideous  heads  in  all  the 
different  countries  of  Asia  and  Europe.  It  was  not  only  in 
those  countries  which  have  been  already  mentioned  that 
the  baneful  curse  of  suicidal  war  has  been  experienced,  for 
the  two  Americas  with  their  Indian  Isles  have  suffered 
under  similar  experiences. 

The  Yankee  inhabitants  of  the  United  States  were  in  the 
habit  of  boasting  before  their  great  and  now  historic  internal 
war  that  their  country,  unlike  other  countries,  was  greatly 
favoured  and  peculiarly  blessed  by  Heaven,  because  of  a 
total  absence  of  civil  wars  in  their  Fatherland.  But  in 
April,  1861,  did  not  the  world  see  the  Yankees  of  the 
South  pitted  against  the  Yankees  of  the  North  ?  And  were 
not  the  former  finally  crushed  in  May,  1865  ?  That  great 
suicidal  struggle  had  the  question  of  Africo- American 
slavery  as  its  fotts  et  origo  ;  and  it  scattered  Yankee  vaunting 
to  the  winds.  That  American  civil  war  was  the  greatest  of 
modern  times,  since  upwards  of  a  million  men  are  said  to 
have  perished  ia  the  struggle. 

But  where,  in  any  of  the  two  Americas,  has  civil  war  not 
shown  its  hideous  head  ?  What  shall  we  say  of  the 
periodical  convulsions  into  which  they  are  thrown,  which 
agitate  Mexico,  Costa-Rica,  Honduras,  Guatemala,  San 
Salvador,  Nicaragua,  Columbia,  Venezuela,  Peru,  Bolivia, 
and  Ecuador  ?  Do  not  all  these  historical  cases  of  internal 
struggle  testify  to  the  fact  that  the  Americas  are  still  enslaved 
by  the  hydra-monster  of  Civil  War,  whose  baneful  influence 
they  are  unable  to  shake  off? 

Chili  and  Argentina,  the  greatest  of  South  American 
Republics  (and,  with  Mexico  and   Brazil,    the  greatest  of 


192  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Americo-Latin  Republics  in  the  Americas),  cannot  boast 
that  they  have  had  no  civil  wars.  The  latter — Argentina  — 
has  but  recently  treated  the  world  to  a  display  of  civil  war, 
when  the  descendant  of  one  conquistador  made  the 
descendant  of  another  conquistador  bite  the  dust.  And 
Civil  War  is  now,  as  we  write,  being  carried  on  with  the 
greatest  vigour  and  animosity  between  the  Government  of 
Balmaceda  and  his  opponents  of  the  Congressional  party  in 
Chili.* 

The  statement,  then,  which  Mr.  James  Anthony  Eroude 
makes  in  his  'English  in  the  West  Indies,'  and  which  Mr. 
W.  Laird  Clowes  slavishly  quotes,  to  the  effect  that  we 
Africans  are  an  inferior  race,  '  because,  as  yet,  they '  (the 
Africans)  *  have  shown  no  capacity  to  rise  above  the  con- 
dition of  their  ancestors,  except  under  European  laws, 
European  education,  and  European  authority  to  keep  them 
from  war  upon  one  another,'  seems  to  us,  and  surely  it  will 
to  the  unbiased  reader,  to  be,  on  the  face  of  it,  foolish  and 
ridiculous.  Scarcely  any  nation  under  the  sun  has  had 
indigenous  civilization ;  and  almost  every  nation  under  the 
sun  has  had  experience  of  civil  war  in  the  past,  and  even  in 
this  century  there  are  countries  whose  peoples  periodically 
wage  fierce  civil  and  suicidal  war  upon  one  another. 

On  page  202  of  '  Black  America,'  W.  Laird  Clowes 
writes  :  *  In  no  British  colony,  for  example,  is  there  any 
reason  why  a  capable  Negro  should  not  raise  himself  to 
high  position  and  honour.  In  no  British  colony,  on  the 
other  hand,  does  the  Negro  govern.  And  I  think  it  may 
also  be  said   that  in   every  British  colony  in  which  he  is 

*  Decisive  and  sanguinary  Placilla,  on  the  27th  August,  1891, 
terminated  fratricidal  strife  in  Chili  ;  Congressional  General 
Canto,  fresh  from  the  slaughter  of  his  opponents  at  Concon, 
crushing  and  slaying  the  Balmacedist  Generals  Orozimbo 
Barboza  and  Josd  Miguel  Alcdrreca  on  that  field. 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  193 

be   found,  the  Negro  is  a  fairly  happy  and  contenteci 
person.' 

Mr.  Clowes  does  not  seem  to  be  aware  that  there  is  one 
reason,  and  that  it  is  the  head  and  chief  of  all  reasons, 
why  the  African  '  cannot  raise  himself  to  high  post  and 
honour  in  any  British  colony.'  The  truth  is,  that  fat  and 
lucrative  berths  in  the  Colonies,  whether  in  British  Africa 
or  in  the  British  West  Indies,  are  sedulously  kept  for  the 
Europeans ;  though  too  often  these  Europeans  are  incom- 
petent and  incapable.  They  are,  sadly  too  often,  the 
refuse  and  the  failures,  the  bankrupts,  the  spendthrifts, 
and  the  scum  of  the  British  population;  while  deserving 
and  capable  Africans  are  uniformly  and  systematically  kept 
in  the  background.  Let  the  African  work  as  he  may,  he 
reaps  none  of  the  harvest  of  his  work  by  securing  official 
positions  in  a  British  colony. 

In  our  own  island  home  of  Trinidad  we  have  known 
intelligent  youths  of  African  blood  who  have  been  com- 
pelled to  leave  school  or  college  much  earlier  than  they 
wished,  because  of  their  parents'  inability  to  provide  a 
suitable  pittance  to  maintain  them  any  longer.  And  the 
moment  they  are  out  of  school,  these  young  men,  as  a 
matter  of  course,  always  make  it  their  business  to  apply 
for  some  appointment  in  the  Civil  Service  of  the  Colony. 
But  do  they  succeed  ?  No,  they  seek  quite  fruitlessly ; 
though  the  very  moment  the  white  boys,  often  of  shallow 
and  mediocre  ability,  get  out  of  school,  and  no  matter 
whether  they  come  from  the  higher  or  the  lower  classes, 
they  are  made  welcome  to  every  remunerative  post  at  the 
disposal  of  the  Government,  and  promotion  for  them  is  as 
rapid  as  they  could  desire.  It  is  the  same  cry  all  the  British 
Empire  over  where  the  African  abides.  The  African  is 
resolutely  kept  in  the  background. 

In  this  way,    then,   is   the  x^frican   '  stopped  short,'  and 

13 


194  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

prevented  from  occupying  *  high  position  and  honour '  in 
the  Civil  Service.  It  is  not  a  matter  for  wonder  if  the 
Gallic  King  Brennus's  old  but  expressive  saying  of  Vce 
victis!  ('Woe  to  the  vanquished!'),  or  the  familiar  poetic 

words, 

'  The  good  old  rule,  the  simple  plan, 
That  they  should  take  who  have  the  power. 
And  they  should  keep  who  can,' 

should  be  forcibly  called  to  the  African's  mind. 

What  African,  we  say,  who  has  the  welfare  of  his  race 
at  heart,  indulges  in  the  delusive  hope  that  every  talented 
countryman  of  his — being,  as  he  is,  a  member  of  an  un- 
fortunate and  subject  (but  not  degraded  and  down-trodden) 
race — will  always  get  his  abilities  recognised  by  the  Govern- 
ment of  a  ruling  race  like  the  Caucasian  ?  No  ;  the  African 
who  has  the  welfare  of  his  race  at  heart  will  counsel  his  re- 
liant, self-respecting  brethren  to  depart  from  the  land  where 
the  Caucasian  rules,  and  go  to  the  land  of  his  African  fore- 
fathers, the  land  where  the  African  rules.  He  will  advise 
all  his  countrymen  who  are  living  under  Caucasian  rule  to 
go  to  that  land  of  liberty,  the  Republic  of  Liberia,  'The 
Lone-Star  of  Liberia.'  If  the  degenerate  Saxons  held  no 
honoured  positions  in  England  when  they  were  smarting 
under  the  iron  rule  of  their  Norman  lords  and  masters, 
that  is  no  reason  why  those  Africans  who  remain  under 
British  and  Yankee  rule  should  not  hold  positions  of  trust 
and  honour,  when  they  deserve  them,  in  the  Colonial  Civil 
Service.  Do  not  the  European  possessions  in  Africa  and 
in  the  West  Indies  annually  send  forth  their  thousands  of 
young  Africans,  who  betake  themselves  to  the  various 
European  centres  of  learning  as  students  of  law,  medicine, 
theology,  engineering,  etc.,  etc.,  etc.  ? 

The  African  indulges  in  a  vain  hope,  indeed,  who  believes 
that  his  dark-skinned  face  will  be  given  the  preference  when 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  195 

he  competes  for  any  Government  appointment  under  the 
Caucasian  flag  if  there  happens  to  be  a  pale-faced  can- 
didate in  the  field. 

It  is  true  that,  now  and  again,  the  abilities  of  the  African 
do  receive  official  recognition,  and  Africans  are  occasionally- 
entrusted  with  posts  of  honour  and  trust;  and  yet,  even 
then,  those  Africans  are  seldom,  if  ever,  promoted. 

One  may  find  a  black  United  States'  Minister  to  Hayti ; 
a  black  Chief  Justice  in  Barbadoes ;  a  black  Magistrate  in 
Trinidad ;  a  black  Chief  Magistrate  in  Gambia ;  two  or 
three  black  Magistrates  in  the  Gold  Coast,  and  perhaps 
one  or  two  black  Magistrates  in  Sierra  Leone  and  Lagos, 
as  well  as  one  or  two  law  and  medical  officials  of  Colonial 
Governments ;  yet  these  Africans  are  never  promoted — 
they  are  'stopped  short.'  And  we  are  of  opinion  that  the 
few  appointments  which  British  Africans  hold  in  British 
West  Africa  are  due  more  to  the  fact  that  the  West  African 
climate  pervading  British  territory  in  that  sphere  is  more 
or  less  unsuitable  to  the  constitution  of  Britishers  than 
from  a  wish  to  loyalize  Goldcoasters,  Sierra  Leoneans, 
Lagians,  and  Gambians,  and  make  them  more  and  more 
amenable  to  British  rule.  But  are  the  authorities  blind  to 
the  fact  that  they  have  Frenchmen  and  Germans  for  neigh- 
bours in  Africa?  What  with  the  contiguity  of  the  Liberian 
Republic  to  the  British  possessions  of  the  Gold  Coast, 
Lagos,  Sierra  Leone,  and  Gambia — what  if  the  African 
inhabitants  of  these  possessions  were  to  suddenly  unfurl 
the  flag  of  independence,  and  join  the  promising  Republic 
of  Liberia,  their  neighbour  ?  We  should  not  be  sorry  to 
see  European  West  and  Central  Africa  joining  the  Liberian 
flag,  and  we  firmly  believe  and  prophesy  that  it  is  the 
destiny  of  all  West,  and  Central,  and  other  Africans  to 
become  Liberians  !  !  ! 

Mr.  Clowes  tells  us  that  *  in  no  British  colony  does  the 

13—2 


196  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Negro  govern.'  We  all  know  that  to  be  so ;  but  the  asser- 
tion of  the  truth  of  that  fact  only  declares  it  to  be  the  more 
shameful. 

But  Mr.  Clowes  again  tells  us  that  '  in  every  British 
colony  in  which  he  is  to  be  found  the  Negro  is  a  fairly 
happy  and  contented  person.'  If  getting  educated,  ac- 
quiring a  profession,  learning  a  trade,  and  building  up 
wealth,  and  gaining  through  these  things  social  inde- 
pendence, make  up  the  sum-total  of  happiness,  then  many 
an  African  may  be  said  to  be  '  fairly  happy  and  contented ' 
under  the  British  flag.  Africans  living  under  the  rule  of 
the  British  are  not  contented ;  they  would  like  to  have  their 
abilities  recognised.  They  are  longing  to  enjoy  the  fran- 
chise, and  to  be  members  of  colonial  parliaments  and 
governments,  and  to  hold  positions  of  trust  and  honour 
wherever  Africans  are  to  be  found,  and  especially  where 
they  predominate  numerically.  But  what,  we  ask,  does 
Mr.  Clowes  know  of  the  '  fair  happiness  and  contentedness  ' 
of  the  Africans  in  the  British  colonies? 

Is  it  not  singular,  as  well  as  anomalous,  that  the 
Bermudas  and  Bahamas,  small  West  Indian  Isles,  with 
literally  a  handful  of  inhabitants,  as  well  as  the  Leeward 
Islands,  though  to  a  limited  extent,  enjoy  the  franchise  and 
send  representatives  to  their  respective  legislatures,  while 
the  great  Colony  of  Jamaica  has  hardly  any  representation  ; 
while  the  great  Colonies  of  Trinidad  and  Tobago,  British 
Honduras,  and  the  Windward  Group  of  Islands  have  no 
franchise  and  no  representation  ? 

Is  it  not  singular,  and  an  anomaly,  that  the  Bermudas 
Islands,  with  16,000  inhabitants,  who  are  for  the  most  part 
Africans,  send  thirty-six  elected  members  to  their  House  of 
Assembly;  that  the  Bahamas,  with  48,000  inhabitants, 
mostly  Africans,  send  29  elected  members  to  their  Repre- 
sentative Assembly;    that  the   Leeward,  with    120,000  in- 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  -197 

habitants,  mostly  Africans,  send  but  10  elected  members  to 
their  General  Legislative  Council ;  while  British  Honduras, 
with  a  population  of  28,000,  Africans  for  the  most  part 
— unlike  the  Bermudas,  with  16,000  people — is  a  Crown 
Colony;  while  the  Windward  Islands,  with  a  population  of 
96,000,  Africans  for  the  most  part — unlike  the  Bahamas, 
with  merely  48,000  people — are  taxed,  but  are  unrepre- 
sented ;  while  Barbadoes,  with  172,000  inhabitants,  mostly 
Africans,  sends  24  elected  members  to  its  House  of 
Assembly;  the  Bermudas  Islands,  with  16,000  inhabitants, 
sending  36  elected  members  to  their  House  of  Assembly  ; 
and  the  Bahamas,  with  48,000  people,  sending  29  elected 
members  to  their  Representative  Assembly  :  while  the 
United  Colony  of  Trinidad  and  Tobago,  with  an  estimated 
population  of  205,000,  mostly  Africans,  has  the  franchise 
and  representation  withheld  from  it,  and  is,  in  fact, 
governed,  or,  rather,  misgoverned,  as  a  Crown  Colony? 
Is  it  not  singular,  and  an  anomaly,  that  British  Guiana,  with 
282,000  inhabitants,  mostly  Africans,  except  that  it  sends 
6  or  7  representatives  to  the  Legislature,  is  practically  a 
Crown  Colony,  while  the  Bermudas,  Bahamas,  the  Leeward 
Islands,  and  Barbadoes,  colonies  of  fewer  inhabitants,  and  of 
less  progressive  character,  are  more  adequately  represented? 
Is  it  not  also  singular,  and  anomalous,  that  Mauritius,  with 
373,000  inhabitants,  mostly  Africans,  sends  only  2  repre- 
sentatives to  the  Council,  and  but  10  elected  members  to 
the  Legislative  Council,  while  Jamaica,  with  581,000  people, 
mostly  Africans,  sends  only  9  representatives  to  its  Legisla- 
tive Council  ?  But  '  truth  is  stranger  than  fiction,'  they  say. 
It  can  thus  be  seen,  therefore,  that  in  every  British  colony 
where  Africans  preponderate  to  any  great  extent,  that  colony 
either  has  not  received  a  Constitution,  or  the  Constitution 
which  that  colony  has  is  very  limited  and  curtailed  in  its 
provisions. 


198  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

There  is  every  reason  to  expect  that,  on  some  future 
day,  the  Bahamas  and  Barbadoes  (the  latter  with  the  greater 
probability  and  certainty)  will  be  deprived  of  their  Con- 
stitution by  the  Imperial  Parliament,  because  of  the  rapid 
increase  of  Africans  in  those  two  colonies  since  Emanci- 
pation. Assuming,  of  course,  that  the  Africans  remain  in 
Barbadoes  and  the  Bahamas,  and  do  not  migrate  to  their 
Fatherland,  Africa,  as  we  earnestly  hope  they  will  do. 

The  original  Jamaican  Constitution,  which  had  existed 
for  200  years  (and  which  was  'Representative),  was  done 
away  with  in  December,  1866.  It  consisted  of  a  Governor, 
a  Privy  Council,  a  Legislative  Council,  a  Legislative 
Assembly  of  47  Representative  Members,  and  a  paid  body, 
which  went  by  the  name  of  the  Executive  Committee,  and 
were  the  responsible  Ministers  of  the  Crown  in  Jamaica 

On  the  initiation  of  the  Jamaican  Assembly  on  the  20  th 
December,  1866 — and  the  resolution  was  unanimously  con- 
firmed on  the  22nd  December  in  the  same  year  by  the 
superior  body,  the  Legislative  Council,  and  assented  to  by 
the  then  Governor  on  the  23rd  December,  1866  —  the 
British  Crown  was  invited  to  grant  another  Constitution  to 
Jamaica,  a  Constitution  suitable  to  the  altered  condition  of 
the  colony.  A  motion  of  this  sort,  coming,  as  it  did, 
immediately  after  the  Jamaican-African  Gordon  Rising  of 
1865,  cannot  but  bring  home  the  fact  to  the  mind  of  the 
average  individual,  that  the  British  authorities  were  filled 
with  alarm  on  account  of  the  Africans  in  Jamaica,  and 
brought  pressure  to  bear  on  the  legislative  bodies  of 
Jamaica.  And  there  are  those  who  maintain,  and  we  are 
with  them,  that  Her  Britannic  Majesty's  Earl  Derby's  Third 
Government  actually  interfered  with  and  suspended*   the 

*  Who  knows  what  part  that  curse  of  civilization,  Secret 
Sfervice  Money,  played  in  Jamaica  during  Lord  Derby's  Third 
Administration  } 


UNDER  CA  UCA  SI  AN  RULE.  199 

Constitutional  Government  then  existing  in  Jamaica  in 
1866.  At  the  same  time  Lord  Derby's  Government  con- 
trived to  secure  the  allegiance  of  the  wavering  in  Jamaica, 
for  there  were  not  a  few  malcontents  who  had  not  un- 
naturally taken  umbrage  because  of  that  unjust  and  arbi- 
trary measure.  And  why  should  we  not  suppose  that  the 
Jamaican  whites,  remembering  that  it  was  not  the  first  time 
that  a  part  of  the  Jamaican  Africans  had  risen  in  arms  (some 
Jamaican  Maroon  slaves  having  risen  in  1795''''  and  1832),! 
and  not  unmindful  of  the  fact  that  the  Africans  were  increasing 
to  an  alarming  extent  since  Emancipation,  were  seized  with 
panic,  and  gladly  advocated  the  change  in  the  Constitution  ? 
There  was  also  the  proximity  of  Jamaica  to  Hayti.  Might 
not  the  Jamaican-Africans  wish  to  follow  Hayti's  example, 
and  make  a  bold  effort  to  secure  Independence?  Agitated 
with  feelings  of  personal  safety  and  self-interest,  this  party 
did  not  hesitate  (they  commanding  a  majority  in  the  Jamaican 
Legislature)  to  surrender  the  Constitution  which  had  ex- 
isted for  200  years  ? 

As  far  back  as  1830 — that  is  to  say,  eight  years  before 
the  generality  of  Africans  thought  that  the  justifiable  and 
legitimate  Act  of  Emancipation  would  have  been  granted 
them — the  elective  franchise  was  being  exercised  by  such 
of  the  Africo-Jamaicans  as  were  enjoying  the  blessings  of 
freedom  and  citizenhood.  When  Emancipation  or  En- 
franchisement, and  in  its  train  full  and  unqualified  Citizen- 
ship, came  in  August,  1838,  the  Jamaican  Africans  were 
enabled,  we  are  told,  speedily  to  send  some  representatives 

*  'English  Cyclopaedia  of  Geography,'  vol.  iii.,  p.  321.  From 
1655  *  the  slaves'  (to  quote  the  *  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol. 
xiii.,  p.  550)  '  called  Maroons  .  .  .  who  had  fled  to  the  mountains, 
continued  formidable.  Down  to  the  end  of  the  eighteenth 
century  the  disaffection  of  the  Maroons  caused  much  trouble.' 

t  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  xiii.,  p.  551. 


200  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

of  their  own  race  to  the  Legislative  Council  or  Upper 
House,  and  many  more  of  their  prominent  men  to  the 
Legislative  Assembly  or  Lower  House  of  Jamaica. 

Jamaica,  at  the  present  day,  is  under  the  baneful  in- 
fluence of  a  semi-Crown  Colony  system  of  Government ; 
Jamaica  sending,  as  it  does,  but  9  representatives  to  the 
Legislative  Council,  is  but  inadequately  represented  when 
its  581,000  inhabitants  are  considered. 

The  administration  of  justice  as  it  is  in  Jamaica  and 
Trinidad,  can  only  be  one-sided  and  corrupt  under  the 
degenerating  and  deteriorating  influence  of  Crown  Colony 
Government  and  its  concomitant  red-tapism. 

Were  the  Jamaican  Governmental  Administration  also 
composed  of  sound  materials,  would  the  bungling  Jamaican 
Director  of  Public  Works,  Valentine  Graeme  Bell  (who,  like 
his  prototype  of  Trinidad,  the  blundering  and  extravagant 
Director  Tanner  of  Public  Works)  have  been  allowed  to 
sell  and  hand  over  the  Jamaican  Government  Railway  to 
an  American  Company?  The  British  Government  of 
Jamaica,  when  it  handed  its  Railway  over  to  the  Yankees, 
sold  its  birthright  for  a  mess  of  pottage.  Only  under  a 
Crown  Colony  Government  could  such  a  mistake  have  been 
committed. 

The  Queenslanders,  in  November,  1888,  would  have  none 
of  Governor  Sir  Henry  A.  Blake  on  account  of  his  previous 
bad  record  as  a  member  of  the  Royal  Irish  Constabulary, 
he  having  been  engaged  in  batoning  his  Irish  countrymen 
because  they  differed  from  him  in  politics  ;  and  also  as  a 
Resident  Magistrate,  he  having  oppressed  the  Irish  people. 
The  Queenslanders  petitioned  Lord  Knutsford  to  keep  his 
enfant  terrible  at  home,  and  then  the  authorities  at  Downing 
Street  thought  that  the  next  best  thing  for  them  to  do  was 
to  seek  out  a  colony  on  which  to  foist  \\i€\T protege.  Jamaica 
was  the  colony  they  fixed  upon,  and  the  man  who  was  not 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  201 

thought  good  enough  for  the  Queenslanders  was  saddled 
on  Jamaica,  and  appointed  her  Governor  in  the  very  next 
month,  in  December,  1888.  The  Jamaican- Africans  offered 
no  protest  when  the  rejected  of  Queensland  was  foisted 
upon  them.  The  countrymen  of  George  William  Gordon, 
the  hero-martyr  of  1865,  might  have  done  so,  but  they 
would  have  been  simply  bringing  punishment  and  disability 
on  their  own  heads  ;  but  when  Queensland  gave  a  veto  to 
Blake's  being  appointed  her  Governor,  the  Home  Govern- 
ment never  seriously  thought  of  enforcing  obedience  to  its 
mandate.  They,  no  doubt,  bethought  themselves  of  the 
lesson  which  the  American  colonies  taught  their  fathers  in 
the  days  when  the  obstinate  German,  the  Third  George, 
was  King.  They  wisely  refrained  from  annoying  the 
Queenslanders.  It  is  very  probable  that  had  the  Jamaican- 
Africans,  like  the  Queenslanders,  protested,  and  been  pre- 
pared to  back  up  their  protest  by  force,  against  the  appoint- 
ment of  Sir  Henry  Arthur  Blake  as  their  Governor,  a  few 
British  ships-of-war  would  have  been  promptly  sent  by  Lord 
Salisbury's  Government  to  Kingston  and  Port  Royal,  to 
help  to  keep  the  '  fairly  happy  and  contented  '  Africans  quiet, 
or,  rather,  '  suppress  '  them. 

Absenteeism  on  the  part  of  the  sugar-lords  (the  same 
sort  of  absenteeism  on  the  part  of  the  British  Crown  and 
the  landlords  which  is  felt  in  Ireland,  and  which  is  respon- 
sible for  much  of  the  misery  prevalent  in  the  Emerald  Isle, 
and  for  the  constant  and  unremitting  agitation  which  dis- 
tracts that  unfortunate  kingdom,  and  is  lashing  the  Irish 
people  into  disloyalty,  as  well  as  forcing  them  to  migrate 
from  their  native  land  to  the  United  States)  is  rampant  in 
the  West  Indian  Colonies,  Trinidad,  and  Jamaica  especially. 
This  absenteeism,  which  paralyzes  and  cripples  the  progress 
of  the  colonies,  is  also  ruining  their  people. 

Is  it  not  an  injustice  and  an  anomaly  that  the  sugar — 


202  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  mainstay  and  chief  staple  of  the  colony — the  sugar 
which  is  grown  in  Trinidad,  and  is  worked  and  manu- 
factured by  the  labour,  the  exertion,  and  the  skill  of 
Trinidadian  Africans  for  British  sugar-lords,  is  sold  at  ijd. 
and  2d.  per  pound  in  the  British  Isles,  while  the  prices  in 
Trinidad  for  Trinidadian  sugar  do  not  fetch  a  halfpenny 
less  than  4d.  and  6d.  per  pound  ? 

As  a  matter  of  course,  and  as  the  result  of  the  crooked 
policy  of  blundering  red-tapism,  that  amount  of  sugar 
which  many  a  poor  man  in  the  British  Isles  is  able  to 
buy  and  consume,  the  poor  Trinidadian  African  is  dis- 
qualified from  procuring  in  Trinidad,  though  if  he 
were  living  in  Britain  he  could  procure  it  with  the  greatest 
facility. 

The  British  judges  in  Trinidad  are  now  engaged  in 
stirring  up  class  against  class,  the  poor  against  the  rich, 
and  all  for  the  sake  of  winning  a  transient  popularity ;  and 
we  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that  the  authorities  at  Downing 
Street  made  a  grievous  mistake  when  they  sent  Sir  John 
Gorrie  and  his  '  learned  '  brothers,  Justices  Cook  and  Lumb, 
to  Trinidad. 

Perjury  prevails  to  an  alarming  extent  in  Trinidad,  for 
many  an  indigent  rascal  and  fortune-hunter  looks  upon  the 
Trinidadian  Law  Courts  as  the  best  and  surest  places  in 
which  to  make  his  fortune;  and,  relying  on  the  fact  that 
others  before  him  have  succeeded  in  the  nefarious  traffic, 
the  perjurer,  we  say,  does  not  hesitate  to  urge  his  spurious 
and  fictitious  claims  against  some  wealthy  men  whom  he 
has  never  seen,  or  has  never  spoken  to  in  his  life ;  or,  if 
he  brings  an  action  against  some  wealthy  man  with  whoni 
he  has  transacted  business,  the  chances  are  ten  to  one  that 
he  has  no  real  claim  whatever  upon  him. 

The  young  brigade  of  briefless  lawyers  deliberately  help 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  203 

to  complicate  the  position  in  Trinidad ;  because  these  (the 
)  oung,  not  the  old  lawyers),  being  themselves  indigent  and 
out  of  work,  take  upon  themselves  the  role  of  barrators, 
and  are  encouragers  of  litigation.  There  are  several  that 
we  know  of  who,  instead  of  helping  to  mitigate  the  evil, 
are  simply  a  disgrace  to  the  noble  and  honourable  pro- 
fession. And,  as  if  to  complicate  matters  still  more.  Sir 
John  Gorrie,  the  Chief  Justice  of  Trinidad,  and  the 
Attorney-General,  the  Hon.  S.  H.  Gatty,  Q.C.,  who  began 
their  feuds  in  Antigua  (as  if  the  world  was  not  large  enough 
for  these  two  men  !),  have  been  sent  to  Trinidad,  as  to 
a  better  and  fairer  battling-ground.  Such  disagreements 
serve — when  the  Chief  Justice  and  the  First  Law  Officer 
of  the  Crown  fall  to  loggerheads — but  to  create  a  judicial 
deadlock.  As  a  consequence  of  such  disagreements, 
the  Attorney-General  is  generally  conspicuous  by  his 
absence  from  the  Law  Courts  when  matters  are  brought 
forward  which  require  his  attention  as  Counsel  for  the 
Crown. 

The  administrators  and  expounders  of  the  law  should  set 
a  good  example  to  the  inhabitants  of  the  colony  by  ceasing 
their  bickerings,  and  concerning  themselves  with  the  business 
of  the  people;  those  high  in  office,  especially  those  who 
administer  the  law,  should  be  above  reproach,  and  not 
indulge  in  party  bickerings.  But  what  will  not  happen 
under  Crown  Colony  Government  ? 

Also  we  may  mention  here  that  the  same  tyranny  on  the 
part  of  the  judges,  which  stifles  public  opinion  and  gags 
the  public  press  in  Jamaica,  Trinidad  and  Tobago,  and 
elsewhere  in  the  West  Indies,  is  paramount  in  British 
Guiana.     Mr.  Louis  de  Souza,"^  a   Barrister-at-Law,  of  Lin- 

*  This  brilliant  African  claimed  descent  from  no  less  a  house 
than  that  of  Royal  Braganza. 


204  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

coin's  Inn,  who  was  a  distinguished  African,  had  the  moral 
courage  to  resist  judicial  tyranny,  and  beard  the  British 
Guiana  judges  in  their  own  den ;  but  he  fell  a  victim  to 
their  resentment  because  of  his  just  notions  of  liberty,  and 
was  by  the  Georgetown  judges  committed  to  the  George- 
town Gaol  for  an  alleged  Contempt  of  Court,  where  he 
forfeited  his  life  through  no  fault  of  his  own.  His  imprison- 
ment raised  him  a  great  many  sympathizers — many  more 
sympathizers  than  he  had  had  when  he  first  began  his 
struggle  with  the  judges ;  while  his  death,  though  it  came 
as  a  surprise  to  his  fellow-men  because  of  its  suddenness, 
made  De  Souza,  already  a  hero,  a  glorious  martyr. 

Of  the  many  white  men  of  doubtful  adaptation  who  have 
been  foisted  upon  Trinidad,  John  Edward  Tanner,  the 
Director  of  Public  Works ;  Stephen  Herbert  Gatty,  Q.C, 
the  Attorney-General ;  Samuel  Leonard  Crane,  the  Surgeon- 
General  ;  John  Cook,  the  first  Puisne  Judge ;  Henry  W. 
Chantrell,  the  Auditor-General ;  Charles  B.  Hamilton,  the 
Receiver-General ;  George  Workman  Dickson,  the  Assistant 
Director  of  Public  Works ;  David  Wilson,  the  Commis- 
sioner of  the  Northern  Province  and  Sub-Intendant  of 
Crown  Lands;  and  William  Robinson,  K.C.M.G.,  the 
Governor  and  Commander-in-chief  of  Trinidad  and 
Tobago,  stand  in  prominence. 

Trinidadians  have  an  insufficiency  of  hospitals,  an  in- 
sufficiency of  wards,  nurses,  and  attendants,  while  the 
small  and  inadequate  Port-of Spain  and  San  Fernando 
Hospitals  are  the  only  two  benevolent  institutions  of  the 
kind  in  the  Island  Colony  worthy  of  note.  Supposing 
there  be  a  deficit  in  the  Treasury  of  the  Crown  Colony 
of  Trinidad  which  prevents  the  William  Robinson  Adminis- 
tration from  meeting  the  needs  of  the  inhabitants,  and 
supplying  them  with  more  and  better  hospitals,  more  and 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  205 

better  surgeons  and  physicians,  more  and  better  wards, 
more  and  better  nurses  and  attendants,  there  is  an  alter- 
native or  a  remedy  forthcoming.  And  this  is  the  remedy : 
let  the  British  Secretary  of  State,  the  Right  Honourable 
Lord  Knutsford,  reduce  the  salary  of  the  Governor  and 
Commander-in-chief  of  Trinidad  and  Tobago  (who— will 
it  be  believed  by  him  who  is  not  au  courant  on  the  subject  ? 
— receives  ^5,000  per  annum  as  salary  for  misruling 
Trinidad  and  Tobago,  with  205,000  inhabitants ;  that  is 
to  say,  he — the  Governor — receives  half  as  great  a  salary 
as  his  Excellency  the  President  of  the  United  States  of 
North  America,  General  Benjamin  Harrison,  receives 
annually  for  ruling  63,000,000  Yankees;  that  is  to  say, 
again,  receives  nearly  half  as  much  salary  as  the  Vice- 
President,  the  Secretary  of  State,  the  Secretary  of  the 
Treasury,  the  Secretary  for  War,  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy, 
the  Secretary  for  the  Interior,  the  Secretary  for  Agriculture, 
the  Postmaster-General,  and  the  Attorney-General  of  the 
United  States  of  North  America).  We  suggest  allowing  his 
Excellency  Sir  William  Robinson'''  ;^2,ooo  yearly,  instead 
of  ;£5,ooo ;  and  let  the  British  Secretary  of  State  for  the 
Colonies  reduce  the  salary  of  the  Chief  Justice  of  Trinidad 
and  Tobago  (who  receives  ;^i,8oo  per  annum  ;  that  is, 
only  ;£^2oo  less  than  the  Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States  of  North  America  does),  and 
allow  Sir  John  Gorrie  ;£"i,ooo  instead  of  the  ;^i,8oo  he 
receives  annually ;  let  the  British  Secretary  of  State  reduce 
the  salary  of  the  Attorney-General,  and  allow  him  ^^700 
instead  oi  £^\,ooo\  let  him  reduce  the  salary  of  the  first 

*  Sir  William  Robinson  has  since  been  promoted  to  Hong 
Kong,  having  been  swept  away  from  Trinidad  by  Sir  Frederick 
Napier  Broome,  K.C.M.G.  We  wish  the  Chinese  of  Hong 
Kong  joy  of  their  gift  of  a  Governor. 


2o6  THE  LONE'STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

Puisne  Judge,  and  allow  him  ;^9oo  instead  of  the  ;^i,ooo 
he  is  receiving  annually ;  let  him  reduce  the  salary  of  the 
second  Puisne  Judge,  and  allow  him  ;£^9oo  instead  of  the 
;^i,ooo  he  now  receives ;  let  him  reduce  the  emolument 
of  the  Director  of  Public  Works,  and  allow  him  £^^oq 
instead  of  the  ;£'i,5oo  he  is  now  annually  receiving ;  let  him 
reduce  the  emolument  of  the  Surgeon-General,  and  allow 
him  ;^6oo  instead  of  the  ;^i,ooo  he  now  receives  ;  let  him 
reduce  the  emolument  of  the  Receiver-General,  and  allow 
him  ;£^6oo  instead  of  the  ;£^7oo  he  now  receives;  let  him 
reduce  the  salary  of  the  Assistant  Director  of  Public  Works, 
and  allow  him  ;£"6oo  instead  of  the  ^800  he  now  receives : 
let  him  reduce  the  income  of  the  Commissioner  of  the 
Northern  Province,  and  allow  him  ;^7oo  instead  of  the 
;^8oo  he  receives ;  let  him  reduce  the  allowance  of  the 
Auditor-General,  and  give  him;£'7oo  in  lieu  of  the  ;£^8oo 
he  is  now  receiving.  In  brief,  let  Downing  Street  reduce 
the  salaries  of  the  officials  of  the  Civil  and  Judicial  estab- 
lishments, and,  with  the  joint  proceeds  of  these  reductions, 
enlarge  and  improve  the  existing  hospitals  and  wards ;  build 
more  hospitals ;  employ  a  more  numerous  staff  of  efficient 
nurses  and  attendants ;  get  a  more  numerous  staff  of  com- 
petent medical  men,  weeding  out  those  who  are  not  com- 
petent, in  the  behalf  of  the  Trinidadian /^^/<?. 

But  we  fear  that  there  is  not  the  slightest  likelihood  of 
that  being  done,  though  the  plan  is  feasible  enough.  It  is 
the  same  cry  all  over  the  British  Colonies  where  Africans 
are  in  a  majority;  and  yet  Laird  Clowes  would  have  us 
believe  that  '  in  every  British  colony  in  which  he  is  to  be 
found  the  African  is  a  fairly  happy  and  contented  person.' 

After  the  Trinidadian  people  had  sent  a  numerously- 
signed  petition  to  the  British  Secretary  of  State  for  the 
Colonies  (as  the  outcome  of  an  enthusiastic  mass-meeting 


UNDER  CA  UCA  SI  AN  RULE.  207 

previously  held  in  the  Queen's  Park,  in  the  capital  of  the 
Island-Colony  of  Trinidad,  in  1886),  Trinidadians  of  all 
shades  of  opinion  were  cajoled  into  believing  that  Respon- 
sible Government,  even  on  a  moderate  basis,  would  be 
granted  them,  when  a  Royal  Commission  of  ten  men  was 
appointed  to  inquire  into  the  fitness  of  the  people  for  the 
elective  franchise.  That  Commission,  which  had  for  its 
chairman  the  Attorney-General,  the  Hon.  S.  H.  Gatty,  Q.C., 
sat  for  some  months,  during  which  time  many  witnesses 
were  examined  as  to  the  fitness  of  the  inhabitants  for  a 
Constitution. 

On  the  conclusion  of  their  labours  in  the  examination 
of  witnesses  (who  were  almost  unanimously  in  favour 
of  the  granting  of  Responsible  Government  to  Trini- 
dad), and  immediately  before  closing  their  last  Ses- 
sion and  drawing  up  and  sending  their  Report  to  the 
Secretary  of  State,  the  Chairman  put  it  to  the  vote  of  the 
Members  of  the  Royal  Commission,  whether  they  were  of 
opinion  that  the  inhabitants  of  Trinidad  were  fit  and  ripe 
for  Responsible  Government.  On  a  division  it  was  found 
that  seven  were  for  and  three  Members  (the  chairman  in- 
cluded) were  against  the  granting  of  a  Constitution  or 
Responsible  Government  to  Trinidad.  Those  of  our 
readers  who  are  unacquainted  with  the  fact — and  we  fear 
there  are  only  too  many — will  find  it  strange  perhaps  when 
we  tell  them  that  the  British  Secretary  of  State  abode  by 
the  decision,  or  vote,  of  the  minority^  the  small  minority 
of  the  three  as  against  that  of  the  majority  of  the  Members 
of  the  Commission,  and  absolutely  refused  the  Franchise 
and  Representation  to  Trinidad  and  the  Trinidadians. 

It  is  but  fair  to  say,  we  think,  that  that  Commission,  which 
was  dignified  by  and  rejoiced  in  the  name  of  Royal,  was 
but  a  farce  and  a  mockery  from  beginning  to  end.  The 
witnesses  whom  the  Commission  examined,  and  who  after  a 


2o8  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

severe  cross-examination  proved  the  fitness  of  Trinidad  ians 
for  self-government,  were  set  aside,  and  the  mere  opinion  of 
three  men,  neither  of  whom  had  or  has  any  real  interest  in 
the  Island-Colony,  was  allowed  to  prevail.  Their  seven 
colleagues,  who  were,  and  are,  almost  to  a  man,  bred  and 
born  in  the  colony,  and  have,  or  had,  their  interests  in  the 
colony,  had  their  voice  altogether  ignored. 

We  make  bold  to  say  that  though  the  British  Secretary 
of  State  appointed  a  Royal  Commission  to  inquire  into  the 
fitness  of  the  Crown  Colony  of  Trinidad  for  Home  Rule, 
he  never  intended  that  the  Constitution  should  be  conferred 
on  the  Trinidadians.  And  why  ?  Because  of  the  great 
numerical  preponderance  of  the  African  inhabitants  over 
those  of  British  blood  in  Trinidad.  But  on  what  ground 
or  grounds  do  we  base  this  statement,  our  readers  may 
wish  to  ask?  Only  just  recently  {i.e.^  in  the  earlier  part  of 
the  year,  1891)  Lord  Knutsford,  replying  to  a  British 
Hondurian  petition  praying  for  a  modicum  of  Responsible 
Government,  made  answer  that  the  British  Parliament  never 
ntended  that  the  colony  in  which  the  British  inhabitants 
were  greatly  in  a  minority  and  were  outnumbered  by  the 
people  of  a  different  race  or  nationality,  should  enjoy 
Responsible  Government ;  that  that  was  the  case  with  the 
Colony  of  British  Honduras,  the  number  of  the  African 
inhabitants  greatly  preponderating  over  the  British  in  that 
Peninsula-Colony. 

Now,  if  the  authorities  at  Downing  Street  refused  British 
Honduras  with  28,000  inhabitants  Responsible  Government, 
is  there  any  right-thinking  man  who  will  say  that  the  British 
Parliament  will  ever  grant  Home  Rule  to  the  united  colony 
of  Trinidad  and  Tobago,  which  has  205,000  people,  and 
where  the  Africans  greatly  preponderate  numerically,  and 
in  inteUigence  too,  over  those  of  British  descent? 

When  the  British  Colonial   Secretary  of  State,  therefore, 


UNDER  CA  UCA  SI  AN  RULE.  209 

^pointed  a  Royal  Commission  to  inquire  into  the  fit- 
ness of  Trinidadians  for  Responsible  Government,  well 
knowing  that  the  British  Parliament,  or,  rather,  a  British 
majority-party,  would  never  consent  to  grant  Trinidad 
a  Constitution,  because  of  the  overwhelming  majority  of 
the  Africans  over  the  white  inhabitants,  he  grossly  insulted 
Trinidadians — Trinidadian  Africans  particularly — since  he 
caused  them  to  hope,  and  then  disappointed  them,  in  abso- 
lutely refusing  to  grant  them  what  he  had  from  the  first 
{i.e.,  from  the  receipt  of  the  Trinidadian  petition  and  his 
appointment  of  the  Royal  Commission)  made  up  his  mind 
not  to  grant  them,  viz.,  Home  Rule  or  Responsible  Govern- 
ment, which  are,  in  fact,  identical  terms. 

Again,  was  it  not  a  British  Conservative  ministry,  the 
Third  Conservative  Ministry  of  Earl  Derby,  which  brought 
its  authority  to  bear  upon  the  Jamaicans,  and  pulled  the 
Jamaican  Constitution  to  pieces?  Was  it  probable  that  a 
British  Conservative  Ministry  like  the  present  Second  Con- 
servative Ministry  of  the  Marquis  of  Salisbury,  which  generally 
carries  out  the  traditions  and  principles  of  former  British 
Conservative  Ministries,  would  have  granted  Trinidad  (when 
it  petitioned  for  Home  Rule)  the  same  Constitution  which  a 
previous  Conservative  Administration  destroyed  in  Jamaica 
in  1866,  inasmuch  as  there  were  in  Jamaica,  in  1866,  as 
many  Africans  (the  Africans  in  Jamaica  being  now  more 
than  twice  as  numerous  as  they  were  in  1866)  as  there 
are  now  (189 1)  Africans  in  Trinidad  and  Tobago?  Like 
Jamaica,  like  Trinidad  and  Tobago. 

The  above,  then,  are  the  grounds  on  which  we  say  that 
the  British  Colonial  Secretary  of  State,  when  he  appointed 
the  Royal  Commission  to  inquire  into  the  fitness  of  the 
Crown  Colony  of  Trinidad  for  a  Responsible  Constitution 
never  intended  that  Home  Rule  should  be  granted  to  the 
Trinidadians. 

14 


2IO  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

What  does  the  British  Colonial  Secretary  of  State  do  to 
meet,  as  he  supposes,  the  needs  of  the  Trinidadians  ?  He 
appoints  Louis  Ant.  A.  de  Verteuil,  M.D.,  C.M.G.,  to 
represent  Port-of-Spain,  Jean  Valleton  de  Boissiere,  M.D., 
10  represent  St.  Anna  and  Diego-martin,  Thomas  Alex. 
Finlayson  to  represent  Savana  Grande,  Mayaro,  and 
Cedros,  George  Townsend  Fenwick  to  represent  Arima, 
Blanchisseuse,  and  Toco,  George  Fitt  to  represent  Chagnan, 
Couva,  and  Montserrat,  Charles  Leotaud  to  represent 
Naparima,  Eugene  Cipriani  to  represent  San  Fernando, 
William  Gordon-Gordon  to  share  the  seat  in  the  representa- 
tion of  Port-of-Spain  with  De  Verteuil,  John  Bell-Smyth  to 
represent  Tucarigua,  John  MacKillop  to  represent  Tobago. 
How  would  the  Australasians  or  the  British  North  Americans 
have  received  and  borne  such  a  farce,  such  an  insult? 
Canada  and  Newfoundland  would  have  joined  the  United 
States  of  North  America  quickly  enough,  and  the  Austra- 
lians would  have  established  an  Independent  Republic. 
The  men  Lord  Knutsford  appointed  to  seats  in  the  Legis- 
lative Council  are  all  whites,  and,  it  is  needless  to  say,  they 
do  not  represent  the  Trinidadian  Africans  in  any  way, 
because  they  have  not  been  so  elected  by  the  Africans. 
They  have  all  been  foisted  upon  the  Colony  by  the  British 
Colonial  Secretary  of  a  British  Government. 

Trinidadians,  however,  still  fondly  indulge  in  the  vain 
and  chimerical  delusion  that  on  their  assuming  office  the 
Gladstonian  Liberals  will  be  graciously  pleased  to  grant 
them  '  Home  Rule.'  That  remains  to  be  seen.  But  we 
firmly  believe  that  no  faith  ought  to  be  put  in  either  a 
Conservative  Ministry  dominated  over  by  Lord  Salisbury, 
or  in  a  Gladstonian  Liberal  Ministry  under  the  leadership  of 
Mr.  Gladstone.  We  should  have  more  confidence  in  the 
Irish  Parliamentary  Party,  if  there  were  any  probability  of 
their  coming  into  office,  inasmuch  as  they  are  passionately 


UNDER  CA  UCA  SI  AN  RULE.  211 

longing  to  have  Home  Rule  themselves,  and  they  would 
not  be  indifferent  to  the  claims  of  Trinidad  and  Tobago  for 
the  same  Home  Rule. 

That  Crown  Colony  Government,  hateful  as  it  is,  shall 
continue  dominant  in  Trinidad  and  Tobago  rather  than  that 
the  white  colonial  or  Europo-Creole  inhabitants  should  enjoy 
the  Elective  Franchise  and  Responsible  Government,  and 
the  sweets  of  power  should  be  handed  over  to  Messrs. 
Rostant,  Damian,  Lange,  Guppy,  Goodwille  and  their  party, 
to  the  total  exclusion  of  Trinidadians  of  the  Ethiopian 
race  from  being  participators  and  beneficiaries. 

But  has  Laird  Clowes  heard  of  the  Reform  and  Home 
Rule  Movement  in  Trinidad  ?  If  the  African  '  in  every 
British  colony  in  which  he  is  to  be  found  is  a  fairly  happy  and 
a  contented  person,'  would  he  sign  and  send  a  petition  to  the 
British  Home  Government  praying  that  the  old  rotten 
Crown  Colony  Government  of  Trinidad  should  be  done 
away  with  ? 

We,  unlike  Laird  Clowes,  know  that  '  in  every  British 
colony  in  which '  they  are  to  be  '  found '  the  Africans  are  '  a 
fairly  unhappy  and  discontented  people.'  Nevertheless, 
those  Africans  who  have  the  welfare  of  their  race  at  heart, 
can  render  thanks  to  the  Almighty  for  founding  Liberia, 
the  Light  and  Hope  of  Africa  and  Africans,  to  which  all 
'  fairly  unhappy  and  discontented '  Africans  living  under  the 
Caucasian  flag  can  resort. 

Africans  mainly  compose  the  Police  force  of  Barbados, 
Trinidad  and  Tobago,  and  British  Guiana ;  the  Jamaican 
Constabulary,  which  is  modelled  on  the  semi-military  systetn 
of  the  Royal  Irish  Constabulary — a  force  which  Sir  Henry 
Arthur  Blake,  the  Governor  of  Jamaica,  knows,  without 
doubt,  only  too  well  how  to  wield — is  mainly  composed  of 
Africans  ;  Africans  form  the  strength  and  bulwark  of  the 
Jamaican  Volunteer  Militia ;    of  the  Volunteer   Corps  in 

14—2 


212  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

British  Guiana,  and  Trinidad  and  Tobago,  and  yet  in  none 
of  these  organizations  can  the  African  be  a  Commissioned 
Officer,  every  place  being  usurped  by  the  pale-faced 
Britisher.  In  the  American  Army  and  Navy,  as  well  as  in 
the  American  Militia  and  Police,  Africans  may  be  found, 
but,  like  their  kinsmen  living  under  the  British  flag,  they 
may  never  be  more  than  privates  or  non-commissioned 
officers. 

Many  of  the  Officers  of  the  Royal  Irish  Constabulary 
who  have  batoned  and  broken  the  heads  of  many  a  fellow- 
countryman,  and  whom  the  majority  of  Irishmen  are 
incensed  against  and  dislike,  have  been  thought  good 
enough  to  be  foisted  upon  the  Jamaicans  and  Trini- 
dadians  by  the  authorities  at  Downing  Street.  When  their 
own  countrymen  detest  the  men  composing  the  Royal  Irish 
Constabulary  because  of  their  cruel  ill-treatment  of  brother- 
Irishmen,  is  it  likely  that  the  Officers  of  the  Royal  Irish 
Constabulary  will  ever  entertain  kindly  feelings  towards 
the  dark-skinned  Africans  in  Jamaica  and  Trinidad  and 
Tobago  ? 

It  has  been  shown,  then,  that  in  every  British  West 
Indian  Colony  in  which  he  is  to  be  found  the  African  is 
the  reverse  of  *  a  fairly  happy  and  contented  person,'  but  we 
now  turn  to  other  parts,  and  fresh  fields  and  pastures  new 
— to  Africa,  where  Africans  do  most  abound,  and  to  those 
parts  of  Africa  where  the  British  hold  sway.  We  ask,  are 
the  Africans'  prospects  and  condition  brighter  in  British 
Africa  than  in  the  British  West  Indies,  or  in  the  United 
States  of  North  America?  We  say  not,  and  maintain  that 
they  are  on  a  par,  as  we  shall  presently  endeavour  to 
show. 

The  Gambia  with  15,000,  Sierra  Leone  with  62,000, 
Lagos  with  100,000,  and  the  Gold  Coast  with  1,472,000 
progressive  and  intelligent  inhabitants — the  great  majority 


UNDER  CA  UCA  SI  AN  RULE.  2 1 3 

whom  are  Africans  born  and  bred  and  by  descent — do 
not  enjoy  Representation,  and  have  not  Responsible 
Government,  while  all  the  British  North  American 
Provinces  and  Australasian  Colonies,  with  illiterate  and 
superstitious  men  largely  in  the  ascendant,  make  use  of 
and  enjoy  both, 

The  Cape  Colony,  with  1,430,000  inhabitants,  most  of 
whom  are  Africans,  although  it  has  Responsible  Govern- 
ment, and  sends  22  Representatives  to  its  Legislative 
Council,  and  has  a  House  of  Assembly  of  76  elected 
Members,  refuses  the  Franchise  and  full  and  unqualified 
Citizenship  (in  their  own  country,  too  !)  to  the  Africans, 
while  we  positively  aver  that  we  are  aware  that  the  rulers  of 
the  Colony  of  Natal  (which  boasts  of  an  estimated  popu- 
lation of  5,300,000,  the  large  majority  of  whom  are  Africans) 
deny  the  African  the  franchise  and  representation,  although 
Responsible  Government  now  obtains  in  Natal,  that  Colony 
sending  23  Representatives  to  its  Legislative  Council. 

We  shall  mention  one  more  leading  British  Colony  in 
Africa,  and  that  is  Mauritius,  which  we  had  occasion  to 
refer  to  previously.  We  say  that  with  a  population  of 
373,000,  mostly  Africans,  Mauritius  is  permitted  to  send 
only  2  Representative  Members  to  the  Council  of  Govern 
ment,  and  10  to  the  Legislative  Council,  which  is  an  in- 
adequate representation.  Yet,  though  the  Mauritian  people 
are  inadequately  represented,  their  Constitution  is  pre- 
ferable to  that  of  Jamaica,  or  to  having  none  at  all,  as  in  the 
cases  of  Trinidad  and  Tobago,  Gold  Coast,  Lagos,  etc. 
Because  we  believe  in  the  maxim  that  half  a  loaf  is  better 
than  no  bread. 

The  African  is  relegated  to  the  background,  though  he 
does  all  the  heavy  work  of  the  British  Colonial  Forces  in 
Africa  as  in  the  British  West  Indies.  There  is  the  Police 
Force  of  Mauritius  :    there  are   the  armed  and  mounted 


214  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Police  and  Volunteer  Forces  of  Natal ;  there  is  the  West 
India  Regiment  (composed  of  Africans  from  the  Sergeant- 
Major  to  the  private)  stationed  in  the  Gambia,  Sierra 
Leone,  and  Lagos ;  there  are  the  armed  Constabulary  Force, 
and  part  of  the  West  India  Regiment,  in  the  Gold  Coast ; 
there  are  thirty  Volunteer  Corps,  the  Cape  Police,  and 
Cape  Mounted  Rifle  Forces  of  the  Cape  Colony,  and  though 
the  African  predominates  numerically  in  every  one  of  these 
organizations,  yet  in  none  of  these  does  the  African  hold 
a  responsible  position,  or,  in  other  words,  in  none  is  he  a 
commissioned  officer. 

If  Africans,  like  Caucasians,  are  sufficiently  intelligent 
and  talented  to  become  proficients  in  the  medical,  legal, 
theological,  engineering,  and  surveying  professions,  it  stands 
to  reason  that  they  (the  Africans)  ought  to  be  qualified  for 
the  posts  of  commissioners  of  police,  army  commissioned 
officers,  magistrates,  and  judges,  and,  aye.  Governors  under 
the  British  and  American  flags. 

But  is  it  only  the  African  Ethiopian  in  Africa,  in  the 
Americas  (including  the  West  Indies  and  elsewhere)  who  is 
labouring  under  disabilities  imposed  upon  him  by  red-tape  ? 
By  no  means.  The  Australian  Ethiopian,  unlike  his  African 
cousin,  is  rapidly  disappearing  before  the  march  of  the 
White  Man  and  'Civilization,'  and  that  inevitable  con- 
comitant of  *  Civilization,'  the  Fire-Water,  particularly  the 
eau-de-vie^  the  constitution  of  the  Australian  being  de- 
cidedly weaker  than  that  of  the  African  Ethiopian  in  every 
way. 

It  was  expected  that  the  reaction  following  on  their 
sudden  liberation  would  have  exercised  a  disastrous  and 
fatal  influence  on  the  African  Ethiopians.  A  greater 
mistake  was  never  made,  for,  on  the  contrary,  Africans  have 
increased  and  multiplied  in  an  astonishing  manner,  and  are 
marching  shoulder  to  shoulder  with  Caucasians  and  Civiliza- 


UNDER  CA  UCA  SI  AN  RULE.  2 1 5 

tion,  just  as  the  rest  of  Europeans  formerly  did  with  their 
Roman  civilizers.  Not  so  the  Australian  African,  however, 
for,  as  we  said  before,  he  is  fast  disappearing,  like  the 
American  and  West  Indian,  before  the  progressive  march  of 
Civilization.  The  Australasian  Ethiopian  in  Oceania  is 
dwindling  in  number,  while  the  African  throughout  the  world 
is  increasing  in  number.  There  are  not  perhaps  60,000 
Australian  Africans,  while  they  are  extinct  in  Tasmania ; 
there  are  only  about  8,000  in  New  South  Wales,  and  7,000 
in  Victoria ;  but  it  is  in  Queensland  that  the  greatest 
number  are  found.  In  none  of  the  Australasian  Colonies  are 
they  electors,  or  liable  for  election  ;  and  they  are  not  allowed 
in  any  way  to  interfere  in  politics,  nor  do  they  have  full 
citizenship.  We  sincerely  pity  and  mourn  over  the  mis- 
fortunes of  the  poor  '  black  fellows.' 

At  one  of  the  sittings  of  the  Australasian  Federation 
Convention  in  Sydney  in  the  spring  of  this  year  (1891),  a 
resolution  was  unanimously  passed  by  the  Australasian 
delegates  of  the  Convention  never  to  allow  the  Australasian 
Aborigines  or  Africans  to  have  anything  to  do  with  politics  ; 
they  were  not  to  be  allowed  to  exercise  their  full  citizen- 
ship.* 

With  all  these  facts  before  him,  as  related  throughout  this 
chapter,  will  any  reasonable  and  conscientious  man  say  that 
'  in  every  British  colony  in  which  he  is  to  be  found  the 
African  is  a  fairly  happy  and  contented  person  '  ? 

The  'British  and  Foreign  Anti-Slavery  Society' — an 
institution  which  was  founded  in  1839,  with  illustrious 
Thomas  Clarkson  as  its  first  President — exists  for  two 
avowed  objects;  viz.  (i),  the  universal  extinction  of  slavery 
and  the   slave  trade,  and  (2)  the  protection  of  the  rights 

*  The  most  persistent  opponent  of  the  privileges  the  Austra- 
lasian Aborigines  are  entitled  to  is  Sir  George  Grey,  K.C.B.,  to 
whom  we  owe  no  thanks. 


2i6  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

and  interests  of  the  enfranchised  population  in  the  British 
possessions,  and  of  all  persons  captured  as  slaves.  It  has, 
however,  done  but  comparatively  little  service  since  its 
foundation,  for  both  slavery  and  the  slave  trade  exist  at 
the  present  moment  in  Turkey,  Persia,  the  Belgian  Congo 
Free  State,  in  the  British  South  Africa  Company's  Terri- 
tories, the  British  East  Africa  Company's  Territories, 
as  well  as  in  Zanzibar  and  Pemba,  the  British  Royal 
Niger  Company's  Territories,  and  in  many  other  places  in 
Africa,  more  especially  in  Portuguese  Africa.  Africans  in 
every  part  of  the  British  Empire  are  still  labouring — and 
very  probably,  as  long  as  they  remain  under  the  British 
flag,  will  always  labour — under  disabilities,  notwithstanding 
the  so-called  'protection  of  the  rights  and  interests  of  the 
enfranchised  population  in  the  British  possessions,  and  of 
all  persons  captured  as  slaves,'  by  this  society.* 

Does  or  did  this  society  ever  protect  'the  rights  and 
interests  of  the  enfranchised  population '  in  Trinidad  1  It 
does  not,  and  never  did ;  while  we  venture  to  say  that  it 
never  heard  of  the  agitation  for  Responsible  Government 
by  the  Trinidadians,  and  the  manner  in  which  Lord  Knuts- 
ford  insulted  them. 

We  may  safely  say  here  again  that  Mr.  Clowes,  when 
he  gives  out  that  the  African  '  in  every  British  colony  in 
which  he  is  to  be  found  is  a  fairly  happy  and  contented 
person,'  argues  on  his  ignorance  of  material  facts.  The 
St.  Lucian  African,  far  from  being  '  a  fairly  happy  and  con- 
tented person,'  is  nearly  always  falling  to  loggerheads  with 
the  Administrator  and  Colonial  Secretary,  the  Treasurer 
and  the  Chief  Justice  of  Lucia.  The  African  in  St. 
Vincent,  Grenada,  and  all  the  British   Colonies  has  some 

*  We  personally  decline  with  thanks  the  '  protection  '  of  the 
'  British  and  Foreign  Anti-Slavery  Society,'  or  any  other 
'philanthropic '  society. 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  217 

grievance  or  other,  and  is  consequently  far  from  being  *a 
fairly  happy  and  contented  person.'  Laird  Clowes  tells  us, 
on  pages  156  and  157  in  his  'Black  America,'  that  the  New 
York  Tribune  says  '  with  truth  '—what  is  '  truth '  and  what 
is  not  '  truth '  the  reader  will  see  for  himself — that  '  there 
may  be  one  faith,  one  baptism,  and  one  Name  under 
Heaven  whereby  men  may  be  saved,  but  in  South  Carolina 
there  must  be  a  white  man's  church,  high-toned  and  very 
respectable,  and  a  place  somewhere  outside  where  the 
Negroes  may  herd  together  without  disturbing  the  pious 
meditations  of  their  superiors.  Simon  of  Cyrene,  who 
carried  the  cross,  was  a  Negro,  but  that  passage  in  the 
Gospels  can  be  bracketed,  if  need  be,  and  not  read  in  the 
white  churches  of  Charleston  during  Holy  Week.  The 
Ethiopian  eunuch  baptized  by  Philip  could  not  have  had 
a  white  skin,  but  that  chapter  can  be  omitted  in  the 
liturgical  order  of  second  lessons.  The  white  saints  will 
kindly  consent  to  pray  every  Sunday  for  all  sorts  and  con- 
ditions of  men,  provided  "  the  niggers  "  are  taught  to  remain 
in  their  own  place,  and  not  to  intrude  where  they  are  not 
wanted.  They  will  live  and  die  in  the  faith  and  com- 
munion of  their  white  fathers  and  white  grandfathers,  with 
no  Negroes  on  the  sacred  premises,  except  possibly  the 
coloured  sexton,  who  must  not  under  any  circumstances 
be  a  communicant,  but  merely  a  sweep.  What  arrange- 
ments will  be  made  for  their  benefit  in  the  next  world  they 
cannot  tell,  but  they  may  at  least  indulge  the  pious  hope 
that  there  will  be  a  separate  "  nigger  heaven  " — an  adjunct, 
like  their  own  coloured  convention,  to  the  white  man's 
paradise — a  separate  missionary  jurisdiction,  with  swarthy 
angels  and  combination  Negro  melodies.' 

That  there  is  '  one  faith,  one  baptism,  and  one  Name 
under  Heaven  whereby  men  may  be  saved ' ;  that  Cyrenean 
Simon,  who  carried  his  Saviour's  Cross,  was  an  African ; 


2i8  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

that  the  Ethiopian  eunuch  hailing  from  the  distant  realms 
of  Queen  Candace,  who  was  baptized  by  Philip,  was  an 
African,  are  the  only  '  truths '  which  obtain  in  that  article 
of  the  Neiii  York  Tribune^  which  is  in  every  respect  coarse 
and  brutal ;  it  displays  the  narrow-mindedness  of  the  writer, 
while  its  quotations  reflect  that  of  Laird  Clowes.  The 
article  is,  on  the  whole,  so  puerile  and  farcical  that  it  hardly 
deserves  consideration. 

The  fact  that  Simon  the  Cyrenean  carried  the  Saviour's 
Cross  reflects  great  honour  on  the  African  Race ;  for  while 
Asiatics  and  Caucasians  were  persecuting  the  world's 
Saviour,  the  African,  who  was  present  from  being  a  sym- 
pathizer and  mourner,  was  forced  to  take  upon  himself  the 
task  of  carrying  the  cross ;  and  from  being  an  imposed 
burden,  it  became  a  pleasant  duty  and  an  undying  honour 
to  African  Simon,  and  through  him  to  the  whole  Ethiopian 
race.  How  many  millions  of  Christians  of  all  shades  of 
complexion  have  wished  they  had  been  in  the  Cyrenean's 
place !  The  Asiatics,  in  the  persons  of  the  Jews,  perse- 
cuted the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  Himself  a  Jew;  and  the 
Caucasians,  in  the  persons  of  the  Roman  Pilate  and  his 
soldiers,  rendered  them  active  assistance,  joining  with  the 
Jews  in  the  crucifixion  of  our  Lord;  but  the  part  which 
the  African,  in  the  person  of  Cyrenean  Simon,  took  in  that 
painful  drama  did  not  consist  in  persecuting,  or  helping  to 
persecute,  but  it  consisted  in  succouring  his  Saviour  when 
He  was  unable  to  carry  His  Cross,  in  alleviating  His  pains 
when  He  was  too  weak  to  bear,  and  could  hardly  even 
walk.  And  is  it  because  of  Simon's  achievements,  and 
because  Simon  was  an  African  and  a  '  blameless  Ethio- 
pian,' that  the  sapient  New  York  Tribune  would  have  all 
references  to  him  omitted  '  in  the  white  churches  of  Charles- 
ton during  Holy  Week  '  ? 

But   that  was  not   the    only  triumph   which  Africa   ex- 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE.  219 

perienced  in  connection  with  our  Lord;  for  Africa  must 
be  congratulated  on  the  fact  that,  when  the  Infant  Jesus, 
the  future  Saviour  of  the  world,  was  being  sought  out  for 
slaughter  by  the  tyrant  King  of  Judaea,  Idumsean  Herod, 
and  could  not  be  kept  safe  in  His  own  country,  Asian 
Palestine,  Africa  gave  Him  and  His  saintly  relatives,  Joseph 
and  Mary,  a  home  and  a  shelter  in  that  time  of  need. 
They  remained  in  safety  in  Africa  until  the  cloud  had  dis- 
appeared from  the  horizon,  and  they  could  return  to  their 
own  land. 

The  Neui  York  Tribune,  goes  on  thus  :  '  the  Ethiopian 
eunuch  baptized  by  Philip  could  not  have  had  a  white  skin, 
but  that  chapter  can  be  omitted  in  the  liturgical  order  of 
second  lessons.'  The  New  York  Tribune  and  Mr.  W.  Laird 
Clowes  are  evidently  suffering  from  Africophobia,  and  they 
are,  at  the  same  time,  very  vain  on  account  of  the  colour  of 
their  skin.  Caucasians,  however,  while  they  are  not  un- 
mindful of  the  fact  that  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  was  not  an 
African,  indulge  in  the  delusion  that  He  was  a  white  man, 
seemingly  forgetting  that  Our  Saviour  was  an  Asiatic  of  the 
Semitic  Race.  Yes,  we  say  that  Our  Saviour,  though  He 
was  not  a  descendant  of  Ham,  was  not  a  descendant  of 
Japheth  either,  but  a  descendant  of  Shem ;  and  we  affirm 
that  the  descendants  of  Shem  are  nearer  the  Hamitic  than 
the  descendants  of  Japheth. 

St.  Peter,  the  First  Head  of  the  Christian  Church,  and 
the  other  Apostles  and  the  Jews  were  not  Africans  it  is 
true,  but  neither  were  they  Caucasians  ;  they  were  all  of  the 
Semitic  Race.  Whence  arises,  then,  the  Caucasian  vanity 
for  his  white  skin  ? 

After  telling  us  that  '  there  may  be  one  faith,  one  baptism, 
and  one  name  under  Heaven  whereby  men  may  be  saved,' 
the  New  York  Tribune,  as  quoted  by  Laird  Clowes,  adds  : 
'What  arrangements  will  be  made  for  their  benefit  in  the 


220  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

next  world  they  cannot  tell,  but  they  may  at  least  indulge 
the  pious  hope  that  there  will  be  a  separate  "nigger  heaven" 
— an  adjunct,  like  their  own  coloured  convention,  to  the 
white  man's  paradise — a  separate  missionary  jurisdiction, 
with  swarthy  angels  and  combination  Negro  melodies.' 

We  say  that  if  there  be  one  faith,  one  baptism,  and  one 
church,  there  can  only  be  one  God,  and,  therefore,  one 
Heaven,  not  two.  Yet,  even  supposing  that  the  Africans  in 
Heaven  will  be  '  swarthy  angels,'  and  not  '  white  angels,' 
neither  the  Neiv  York  Tribune^  Laird  Clowes,  nor  any  other 
man  is  able  to  prove  that  the  King  of  Heaven  is  Himself 
white.  What  is  in  a  colour  of  skin  ?  Is  not  black  as  good 
as  white  ?  Is  not  black  the  favourite  colour  princes  and 
peoples  wear  ? 

*  What  arrangements  will  be  made  for  their  benefit  in  the 
next  world  they  cannot  tell,  but  they  may  at  least  indulge 
the  pious  hope  that  there  will  be  a  separate  "nigger  heaven'' 
— an  adjunct  to  the  white  man's  paradise,'  are  the  New 
York  Tribune's  words.  We  tell  the  Neiv  York  Tribune  that 
the  same  *  arrangements  will  be  made  for  our  benefit  in  the 
next  world '  as  for  the  Caucasians  and  all  other  peoples,  and 
that  there  shall  and  must  be  one  Heaven  for  all  ruled  over 
by  one  King,  one  God  ;  while  it  is  not  given  to  the 
Caucasian,  nor  to  any  race  other  than  the  Ethiopian,  to  fix 
what  place  the  African  shall  occupy  or  shall  not  occupy  in 
Heaven.  And  it  seems  to  us  that  the  statement  that  '  there 
will  be  a  separate  "nigger  heaven" — an  adjunct  to  the 
white  man's  paradise,'  is,  to  say  the  least,  absurd  on  the  face 
of  it,  and  a  cruel  and  shameful  taunt. 

'  Dogma  and  Descent,  potential  twin, 
Which  erst  could  rein  submissive  millions  in. 
Are  now  spent  forces  on  the  eddying  surge 
Of  Thought  enfranchised.     Agencies  emerge 
Unhampered  by  the  incubus  of  dread 
Which  cramped  men's  hearts  and  clogged  their  onward  tread. 


UNDER  CAUCASIAN  RULE. 

Dynasty,  Prescription  !  spectral  in  these  days. 
When  Science  points  to  Thought  its  surest  ways, 
And  men,  who  scorn  obedience  when  not  free, 
Demand  the  logic  of  Authority  ! 
The  day  of  manhood  to  the  world  is  here, 
And  ancient  homage  waxes  faint  and  drear. 


22] 


Vision  of  rapture  I     See  Salvation's  plan 

— 'Tis  serving  God  through  ceaseless  toil  for  man  !'^ 

■^  The  above  quoted  lines  were  written  by  our  late  esteemed 
and  distinguished  countryman,  John  Jacob  Thomas,  author  of 
The  Creole  Grammar,'  and  *  Froudacity-PVoudacity,'  in  a  reply 
to  Mr.  James  Anthony  Froude's  '  The  English  in  the  West 
Indies.'  Mr.  Thomas  coined  it  from  the  historian  of  Henry  the 
Eighth's  cognomen,  Froudacity  being  synonymous  with  men- 
dacity. Hence,  an  Africo-American,  a  West  Indo-African,  or 
other  African  would  term  the  assertions  made  by  W.  Laird 
Clowes  and  other  calumniators  of  the  mighty  and  wonderful 
Ethiopian  race, /;(7z^<^<^a(?/^j". 


J 


CHAPTER  VI. 

AFPICA    GOVERNED    BY   THE   AFRICANS. 

We  said,  in  the  first  chapter,  that  we  did  not  propose 
entering  on  a  discussion  respecting  the  excesses  said  to 
have  been  committed  by  the  white  American  Republican 
Liberal  leaders  and  their  American  African  following  during 
the  Reconstruction  period  in  the  Southern  States  of  the 
Yankee  Union,  because  we  are  convinced  that  all  the 
particulars  to  hand  which  have  been  furnished  to  Laird 
Clowes,  a  Conservative,  have  been  furnished  dy  Conse7-vative 
Democrats^  and  are  all  one-sided.  All  such  particulars  are 
greatly  magnified  by  Laird  Clowes,  and  we  are  satisfied  that 
if  any  excesses  were  committed  by  the  Republicans  of  the 
North  during  the  Reconstruction  in  the  South,  those 
excesses  could  only  have  been  committed  by  the  white 
Republicans,  and  the  responsibility,  therefore,  would  lie  on 
them  only. 

These  are  the  reasons,  and  these  only,  which  actuate  us, 
and  prevent  us  from  entering  on  a  discussion  of  the  doings 
of  that  period  in  the  South;  but  when  Laird  Clowes, 
writing  on  *  Reconstruction  in  Mississippi,'  proceeds  to 
quote  the  Southern  Conservative  Democrat,  Ethelbert 
Barksdale,  of  Mississippi,  as  '  employing  the  language  of 
a  Northern  statesman  and  Union  soldier,  that  "  in  the  whole 
historic  period  of  the  world  the  Ethiopian  race  had  never 


AFRICA  GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS.      223 

established  or  maintained  a  Government  for  themselves," ' 
the  situation  is,  as  a  matter  of  course,  altered,  and  facts 
known  to  many  must  be  put  in  the  scale  as  material 
evidences,  and  brought  to  bear  as  such  against  the  mis- 
statements of  the  '  Northern  statesman  and  Union  soldier,' 
of  Ethelbert  Barksdale,  of  Mississippi,  and  \V.  Laird  Clowes, 
with  a  view  to  showing  that,  on  the  contrary,  the  African 
Race  has  had  Governments,  capable  Governments,  of  its 
own  from  time  immemorial,  as  it  has  them  now. 

We  have  already  had  occasion  to  point  out  that  Mr. 
Clowes's  knowledge  of  Africans  and  their  affairs  is  very 
limited,  and  by  endorsing  the  statement  of  Ethelbert  Barks- 
dale,  of  Mississippi,  he  brings  into  greater  prominence  his 
ignorance  of  African  history.  For  the  African  race,  we  are 
happy  to  be  able  to  say,  can  boast  that  ancient  Ethiopia, 
now  modern  Nubia,  had  a  Government  of  her  own,  com- 
posed exclusively  of  African  Ethiopians.  It  is  a  matter  of 
common  knowledge  that  the  ancient  Ethiopians  imparted 
their  religious  arts,  civilization,  and  form  of  Government  to 
the  Semitic  Egyptians.  *  Ethiopia  boasted  of  having  enjoyed 
the  best  of  Governments  under  Azerch,  Arnen,  and 
Piankhi-Meiamen ;  while  from  the  nign  of  the  latter  King, 
and  for  several  generations,  Ethiopia  domineered  over 
Egypt.f  Kashta,  Shabak,  Sabacus,  Tuhraka,  Urdamen, 
Nouat-Meiamen,  Arkamen,  are  also  celebrated  Ethiopian 
Kings  under  whom  Ethiopia  flourished  because  they  were 
capable  governors.^  Queen  Candace,  and  King  Zoskales, 
and  other  Ethiopian  sovereigns  who  succeeded  them,  ruled 

*  Niebuhr's  '  Lectures  on  Ancient  History,'  vol.  i.,  pp.  59,  68, 
yz,  126,  137  ;  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  i.,  p.  65  ;  vol.  vii., 
pp.  742,  743,  737,  740,  741  ;  vol.  viii.,  pp.  611-613  ;  '  Herodotus,' 
vol.  i.,  book  iii.  ;  Smith's  '  Dictionary  of  the  Bible,'  vol.  i.,  pp. 
248,  588,  589. 

t  Ibid.  %  I  did. 


224  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

their  subjects  wisely,  causing  Ethiopia  to  flourish.  All  these 
sovereigns  were  aboriginal  or  indigenous  Ethiopians,  and 
they  were  independent,  owning  no  foreigner  as  their  lord. 
These  Ethiopians  not  only  established  but  maintained  a 
Government  for  themselves."^ 

Abyssinia,  a  State  which  was  closely  allied  to  the  ancient 
and  formidable  State  of  Ethiopia,  had  an  independent 
Government  of  her  own.  Auxum,  its  ancient  capital,  was 
its  most  flourishing  town  and  the  seat  of  its  Government. 
It  was  in  the  sixth  century,  near  about  552,  when  King 
Caleb,  or  Elesbaan,  directed  the  destinies  of  the  State,  that 
the  Abyssinian  power  attained  the  zenith  of  its  early  great- 
ness, and  wrested  Yemen,  in  Arabia,  from  the  grasp  of  the 
Arabians,  after  inflicting  on  this  latter  nation  calamitous 
defeats.t  And  from  about  1255,  when  Icon  Amlac  was 
Emperor,  till  the  sixteenth  century,  the  Abyssinians  had 
capable  and  stable  Governments  of  their  own,  and,  conse- 
quently, Abyssinia  was  in  a  flourishing  condition.  J  All  these 
capable  governors  were  indigenous  Abyssinians.§  The 
Emperor,  or  King,  Theodore,  who  reigned  from  1855  to 
1868,  and  who  revived  the  ancient  greatness  of  Abyssinia, 
must  be  treated  as  belonging  to  the  Hamitic  race,  and 
everybody  knows  that  Abyssinia  enjoyed  a  good  and  stable 
Government  under  him  till  1863,  when  he  got  into  compli- 
cations with  the  British,  was  defeated  by  them,   lost   his 

*  Niebuhr's  '  Lectures  on  Ancient  History,'  vol.  i.,  pp.  59,  68, 
72,  126,  137  ;  '  Encyclopasdia  Britannica,'  vol.  i.,  p.  65  ;  vol.  vii., 
pp.  742,  743,  737,  740,  741  ;  vol.  viii.,  pp.  611-613  ;  '  Herodotus,' 
vol.  i.,  book  ill.  ;  Smith's  '  Dictionary  of  the  Bible,'  vol.  i.,  pp. 
248,  588,  589. 

t  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol  i.,  pp.  64,  ct  scg.;  'English 
Cyclopaedia  of  Geography,'  vol.  i.,  p.  47  ;  and  vide  Job  Ludolf's 
'  Historia  Ethiopia,'  and  Lacroze's  '  History  of  Abyssinian 
Christianity.' 

+  Ibid.  '  §  Ibid 


AFRICA   GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS.      225 

irone,  and  perished  in  1868."^  A  Britisher  thus  eulogizes 
His  Imperial  Majesty,  the  Emperor  Theodore  of  Abyssinia  : 
'  The  late  King  Theodore  of  Abyssinia,  of  whom  we  are  not 
perhaps  disposed  to  take  the  most  favourable  view,  was  a 
ruler  of  no  ordinary  ability.  After  his  accession  to  power 
he  began  to  inaugurate  a  series  of  reforms  which,  it  has 
been  said,  had  he  lived  in  another  country,  or  had  suitable 
advisers  at  his  side,  would  have  gained  him  a  reputation 
equal  to  that  of  Peter  or  Frederick  the  Great.'t 

Who  is  there  who  has  not  heard  of  the  greatness  of 
ancient  Egypt  in  politics,  arts,  literature,  etc.  ?  And  can 
anyone  disprove  that  the  ancient  Egyptians  were  of  the 
Ethiopian  Race  ?|  The  whole  world  knows  that  the 
Babylonian  and  Assyrian  were  mighty  Empires,  whose 
people  were  of  the  Ethiopian  Race.§ 

We  Africans  also  claim  consanguinity  with  the  Cartha- 
ginians, and  were  not  the  Carthaginians  distinguished 
governors?  There  are  a  few  who  maintain,  as  we  had 
occasion  to  point  out  before,  that  the  Carthaginians  were 
of  the  Semitic  race,  and  could  not  have  belonged  to  the 
Ethiopian  race.  With  that  question  we  have  dealt  in  our 
Second  Chapter,  No  doubt  the  Carthaginians  differed  from 
the  Ethiopians  or  Nubians,*who  perhaps,  in  their  turn,  differed 

■^  'Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  i.,  p.  64,  et  seq.;  'English 
Cyclopedia  of  Geography,'  vol.  i.,  p.  47  ;  and  vide  Job  Ludolf's 
'Historia  Ethiopica,'  and  Lacroze's  'History  of  Abyssinian 
Christianity.' 

-|-  British  Workman. 

X  Smith's  '  Dictionary  of  the  Bible,'  vol.  i.,  pp.  588,  589,  741- 
744;  ibid.^  vol.  ii.,  pp.  389-391,  868,869;  '  Herodotus,' vol.  i., 
books  ii.  and  iii.  ;  Volney's  '  Travels,'  vol.  i.,  chap.  iii.  ;  Cata- 
fago's  'Arabic  and  English  Dictionary';  Dr.  Hartmann's 
'  Encyclopasdic  Work  on  Nigritia,'  1876. 

§  Smith's  'Dictionary  of  the  Bible,'  vol.  i.,  p.  127,  et  seq.; 
pp.  149-154,  et  seq.;  ibid..,  vol.  ii.,  p.  546,  et  seq. 

15 


226  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

from  the  Abyssinians,  but  all  these  three  African  nations 
were  Ethiopians,  and  boasted  of  a  common  ancestor  in 
Ham.  Do  not  the  Teutons  and  Celts  differ  from  the  Graeco- 
Latins  and  Slavs,  though  these  all  claim  a  common  ancestor 
in  Japheth? 

Africans,  like  Afro-Canadian  Samuel  Kinggold  Ward  and 
Americo-African  G.  W.  Williams,  however,  do  not  stand 
alone  in  claiming  the  Carthaginians  as  having  belonged  to 
their  race.  The  majority  of  Caucasian  writers  who  refer  to  the 
Carthaginians  and  their  history  support  the  Africans  in  their 
claim.  Mommsen  does  in  his  '  History  of  Rome.'  Mrs. 
Harriett  Beecher-Stowe,  the  celebrated  novelist,  and  writer  of 
many  able  works,  also  supports  that  claim.  For,  writing  on 
page  78,  chapter  xvi.,  in  'Uncle  Tom's  Cabin'  (her  best 
known  work),  she  says  of  Uncle  Tom,  a  typical  African, 
and  the  hero  of  her  work,  that  '  Tom,  in  his  well-brushed 
broadcloth  suit,  smooth  beaver,  glossy  boots,  faultless 
wristbands  and  collar,  with  his  grave,  good-natured  black 
face,  looked  respectable  enough  to  be  a  bishop  of  Carthage^ 
as  men  of  his  colour  were  in  other  ages.'  We  take  Mrs. 
Harriett  Beecher-Stowe  to  mean,  then,  that  the  Cartha- 
ginians were  not  only  Africans,  but  that  they  were  Ethio- 
pians also. 

As  Mrs.  Beecher-Stowe,  who  is  still  alive,  has  never 
thought  fit  to  alter  the  statement  she  made  thirty  years  ago, 
we  must  conclude  that  she  firmly  believes  that  her  state- 
ment is  the  correct  one,  and  the  judgment  of  so  eminent  a 
writer  must  receive  due  weight  and  consideration. 

What  unusual  interest  is  awakened  in  the  breast  of  the 
average  African  when  reading  about  Carthage  and  her 
struggles,  and  her  three  Punic  wars  with  Rome  !  What 
deep  and  joyous  emotion  fills  him  as  he  reads  of  the 
successes  of  the  Hamilcars,  Hannibals,  Hasdrubals,  Maher- 
bals,  Hannos,  Himilcos,  Magos,  Sapphos,  and  Giscos  !    He 


AFRICA  GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS.      227 

takes  exultant  pride  in  their  victories  in  Africa,  Spain,  Italy, 
Sardinia,  Sicily,  and  Corsica.  The  African  sorrows  with  the 
Carthaginians  when  he  reads  that  they  suffered  defeats  and 
experienced  disasters.  He  grieves  when  the  great,  the 
glorious,  the  ancient  Carthage  was  sacked  and  reduced  to 
ashes.  Do  the  sentiment  and  opinion  of  the  African  count 
for  nothing?  Are  they  not  on  a  level  with  those  of  the 
Caucasian  ? 

Now,  to  speak  of  the  Carthaginian  Government.  We  all 
know  that  Carthage  boasted  of  a  Constitution  which  was 
remarkable  for  its  stability  and  firmness  ;  one  that  made  the 
people  happy  and  contented  and  prosperous.  The  great 
Aristotle,  in  his  '  Politics,'  praises  the  Constitution  of  the 
Carthaginians,  because  few  revolutions  were  known  to 
have  ever  taken  place  in  Carthage  before  its  declining  years. 
Carthage  was  wealthy  and  prosperous  everybody  knows  ; 
but  how,  we  ask,  could  her  wealth  and  prosperity  have 
been  attained  save  under  a  good  Constitution  and  an  able 
Government? 

Carthage,  too,  like  Ethiopia  and  Abyssinia,,  gave  birth 
to  a  number  of  great  men.  But  the  five  great  chieftains 
and  governors  who  overtopped  the  rest,  and  threw  them  all 
into  the  shade,  were  Hamilcar  Barca,  the  hero  of  Ercte  and 
Eryx  (who  was  second  only  to  his  son,  Hannibal  the  Great, 
in  renown  and  ability,  in  the  field  and  in  the  cabinet) ;  his 
son-in-law  Hasdrubal ;  and  his  three  sons,  '  the  lion's 
broods,'  the  Brothers  Barcidae,  viz. :  Hannibal  the  Great  (a 
man  who  takes  his  place  with  Napoleon  the  Great,  and 
Caius  Julius  Caesar,  and  Alexander  the  Great),  Hasdrubal, 
and  Mago.  We  do  not  propose  to  enter  into  the  details  of 
their  achievements,  because  they  are  sufficiently  known  to 
the  average  reader.  The  reader  will  have  observed  that  we 
have  elected  to  confer  the  surname  of  '  the  Great '  on 
Hannibal,  the  greatest  of  the  Carthaginians,  and  Toussaint- 

JK — 2 


228  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

L'Ouverture,  the  Liberator,  and  greatest  of  the  Haytians ; 
but  we  did  not  do  this  without  good  reasons,  and  hold  our- 
selves justified  in  so  doing.  They  are  admitted  by  all 
writers  who  deal  with  the  subjects  to  have  been  celebrities. 
Livy,  Plutarch,  Niebuhr,  Mommsen,  Church,  Ward  and 
others,  eulogizing  Hannibal  the  Great ;  while  Caucasians 
like  Samuel  Whitchurch,  Wordsworth,  Whittier,  Wendell 
Phillips,  Lamartine,  Metral,  Dr.  Beard,  Sir  Spencer  St. 
John,  Armistead,  Rainsford,  Schoelcher,  Gragnon-Lacoste, 
Dubroca,  and  Haytians  like  Isaac  Toussaint-L'Ouverture* 
St.  Remy,  B.  Ardouin,  T.  Madion,  A.  Firmin  and  others, 
with  Liberian  Professor  Blyden  and  Afro- American  Colonel 
Williams  eulogize  Toussaint-L'Ouverture  the  Great.  We 
see  no  reason,  then,  for  withholding  the  surname  of  '  the 
Great '  from  Hannibal  Barca  the  Carthaginian,  and 
Toussaint-L'Ouverture  the  Haytian,  who  were  both  African 
and  Ethiopians.  If  we  Africans  do  not  recognise  the 
abilities  of  and  honour  our  countrymen,  who  will  recognise 
and  honour  them?  If  we  Africans  do  not  perpetuate 
the  greatest  of  the  Carthaginians  by  christening  Hannibal 
the  Great,  if  we  Africans  do  not  perpetuate  the  greatest  of 
the  Haytians  by  chr  stening  Toussaint-L'Ouverture  the  Great^ 
who  will  do  this  for  them,  the  children  of  the  '  Land  of  the 
Mighty  Dead'?  Will  the  Caucasians  do  it  for  us?  No 
Caucasian  writer  has  as  yet  conferred  the  surname  of  '  the 
Great '  on  Hannibal  Barca  or  Toussaint-L'Ouverture,  the 
greatest  Africans  who  have  ever  Uved. 

Leaving  Carthage  and  the  Carthaginians  we  turn  to 
modern  times.  And,  we  ask,  have  not  the  Moors  estab- 
lished, and  do  they  not  now  maintain,  a  Government  for 
themselves?  Did  not  the  Moors,  in  710  and  711  of  our 
era,  burst  into  Spain  and  Portugal  and  overrun  that  joinr 
Peninsula,  reducing  the  Iberian  and  the  Lusitanian  provinces 
to  subjection  ? 


AFRICA   GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS.      229 

Would  the  Great  Napoleon  have  been  able  to  bring  all 
Europe,  save  Britain  and  Russia,  to  his  feet  if  he  had  not 
had  a  strong  Government  at  home  ?  Would  the  British 
Wellington  have  been  able  to  gain  the  battle  of  Waterloo  if 
his  Government  at  home  had  not  been  a  strong  one  ? 
Would  the  Yankee  Washington  have  been  able  to  drive 
the  Britishers  into  the  sea,  and  wrest  Independence  from 
the  impotent  grasp  of  stubborn  George  the  Third,  the 
German  King  of  Britain,  if  his  Government  had  been  a 
weak  one  ?  And  we  say  that  the  Moors  never  would  have 
reduced  the  Spaniard  and  the  Portuguese  to  submission  if 
they  had  not  had  a  strong  Government  at  home  in  Morocco. 
They  did  not  quit  Spain  and  Portugal  until  the  dawn  of  the 
seventeenth  century. 

But  who  were,  and  who  are,  the  Moors  save  the  descend- 
ants of  Africans  and  Asiatics?  The  Moors,  we  say,  have 
not  only  established,  but  they  maintain,  a  Government  for 
themselves,  though  the  Britishers,  Frenchmen,  and  Spaniards 
are  doing  their  best  to  partition  Morocco,  just  as  the 
Italians  are  doing  their  utmost  to  grasp  Abyssinia,  which 
enjoys  and  maintains  a  Government  of  her  own  and  is  inde- 
pendent. Morocco  and  Abyssinia,  however,  still  continue 
to  flourish. 

The  State  and  Kingdom  of  Ashantee  was  not  in  the  past 
what  it  is  to-day.  It  is  true  that  Ashantee  possesses  a 
Native  and  Independent  Government  of  her  own  ;  but  fifty 
years  or  so  ago  a  better,  more  capable,  and  more  progres- 
sive Government  sat  at  Coomassie.  It  is  on  record*  that 
King  Osai  Tutu,  who  flourished  in  the  early  part  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  was  the  real  founder  of  the  great 
Ashantee  Empire ;  the  countries  lying  on  the  east  and 
west  of  his  Kingdom  yielding  to  his  powerful  arms.  His 
successor  on  the  Royal  Ashantee  throne,  Osai  Apoko,  made 

*  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  ii.,  p.  681. 


230  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

further  acquisitions  of  territory  to  the  already  vast  Ashantee 
Empire.  No  sane  man  will  for  a  moment  suppose  that 
kings  or  military  leaders  will  venture  to  go  on  distant 
expeditions  of  conquest,  and  stay  away  months,  perhaps 
years,  together  from  their  dominions,  unless  they  leave  a 
firm  Government  behind  them  at  home,  which  can  command 
respect  and  enforce  obedience  to  the  laws  of  the  land.  No 
man  in  his  senses,  we  say,  can  turn  his  arms  abroad  if  his 
Government  be  weak  at  home.  And  Kings  and  Emperors 
like  Osai  Tutu  and  0$^i  Apoko,  renowned  Ashanteans, 
never  would  have  ventured  on  warlike  expeditions  on  their 
own  initiation,  as  they  did,  and  have  left  their  throne 
tottering  behind  them  at  Coomassie.  Judging  by  these 
facts  and  these  results,  the  unbiased  man  is  bound  to  admit 
that  Ashantee  must  have  enjoyed  an  excellent  and  firm 
Government  under  Osai  Tutu  and  Osai  Apoko,  the  cele- 
brated Ashantean  Kings. 

Also,  so  organized,  capable,  and  orderly  a  Government 
had  the  Ashantees  under  King  Osai  Tutu  Quanima,  'a  most 
capable  and  indefatigable  man,  who  directed  the  destinies 
of  his  country  from  the  year  1800  to  the  year  1824,  that 
they  were  able  with  their  well-disciplined  soldiers  not  only 
to  meet  and  cope  with,  but  also  to  inflict  a  crushing  and 
paralyzing  defeat  on,  the  British  General  Sir  Charles 
MacCarthy  and  his  army  at  Essomaco,  off  the  banks  of 
the  Adoomansoo,  in  1824,"^  that  is,  only  nine  years  after  the 
historic  Waterloo,  when  the  Frank  went  down  before  the 
Britisher,  and  when  Britain's  name  was  as  formidable  as  it  is 
at  present. 

We  now  pass  on  to  Dahomey,  and  say  that  this  country 
is  not  now  what  it  formerly  was.     The  Dahomans  are  but  a 

*  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  ii.,  p.  681  ;  Spencer 
Walpole's  '  History  of  England,'  vol.  ii.,  chap,  vii.,  pp.  148-150  ; 
*  Annual  Register  for  1824,'  pp.  206-208  ;  ibid,  for  1826,  p.  223. 


r 


AFRICA  GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS,      231 

wreck  of  their  former  selves.  When  King  Guadjor  Trudo, 
a  man  of  talent  and  energy,  wielded  the  destinies  of 
Dahomey,  the  Dahomans  had  a  Government  to  boast  of. 
And  when  he  died  in  1732,  Trudo  left  Dahomey  in  a 
flourishing  condition,  with  peace  at  home  and  victories 
abroad."^ 

Gezo,  who  ascended  the  Dahoman  throne  about  the  year 
1 81 8,  and  presided  over  the  destinies  of  Dahomey  for  forty 
years,  raised  the  Dahoman  power  to  its  highest  pitch. 
King  Gezo,  the  most  capable  governor  that  the  Dahomans 
have  ever  had,  died  in  1858  full  of  years  and  honour,  and  a 
glory  to  the  African  Race  and  to  Dahomey,  t  He  was  as 
renowned  a  Dahoman  as  Osai  Tutu  Quanima  was  an 
Ashantean. 

From  Dahomey  we  pass  on  to  Sokoto  ;  and  this  country 
also  has  had  a  Government  of  her  own.  It  was  Sultan 
Othman  dan  Fodio  who  founded  the  Empire  of  Sokoto ;  and 
his  son,  Sultan  Bello,  who  reigned  from  181 9  to  1832, 
raised  the  Sokoto  Empire  to  its  greatest  height.  J 

Again,  West  Africa  also  boasts  of  the  States  of  Gandu  and 
Bornu,  the  power  of  the  latter  dating  back  from  the  ninth 
century.  § 

Passing  on  to  South  Africa  we  come  to  Zululand,  which 
was  the  Metropolitan  State  of  the  Great  South  African 
Empire  of  the  Zulu  Kaffirs.  The  early  history  of  Zululand 
and  Southern  Africa,  like  the  early  history  of  Carthage, 
Ethiopia,  Abyssinia,  Morocco,  Ashantee,  Dahomey,  Sokoto, 
Bornu,  Gandu,  Sahara,  Senegambia,  Sierra  Leone,  Soudan, 
Congo,  Wadai,  Darfur,  Mozambique,  Zanzibar,  Sofala, 
Madagascar,  and  Africa  generally,  is  very  largely  unknown, 

*  '  Gazetteer  of  the  World,'  vol.  ii.,  p.  799. 
f  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  vi.,  p.  766. 
X  Ibid.,  vol.  xxii.,  p.  248. 
§  Ibid.,  vol.'iv.,  pp.  61,  62. 


232  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

much  of  it  is  buried  in  oblivion.  And,  unfortunately,  the 
little  that  we  know  of  Africa  and  Africans  is  derived  from 
those  opponents,  if  not  enemies,  of  Africans,  the  Caucasians. 
We  are  informed,  however,  that  in  1780  Sanzangakona 
directed  the  destinies  of  the  Zulus  with  the  greatest  ability, 
and  with  honour  to  himself  and  his  African  and  Zulu 
countrymen."^  And  after  Sanzangakona's  demise,  his  illus- 
trious son  King  Ishaka,  or  Chaka,  at  the  beginning  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  brought  the  Zulu,  the  South  African, 
Empire  to  the  zenith  of  its  greatness,  for  he  conquered  all 
the  States  of  South-Eastern  Africa,  stretching  from  the  River 
Limpopo  to  the  Cape  Colony,  and  comprised  Natal,  British 
Basutoland,  a  large  portion  of  the  Orange  Free  State,  and 
the  Transvaal  Republic.t  Chaka,  or  Ishaka,  the  great 
founder  of  African  dominion  in  South  Africa,  died  in  1828. | 
His  brothers,  Mhlangana,  Dingaan,  and  Panda,  who  suc- 
ceeded him  and  one  another,  though  able,  were  greatly 
inferior  to  Ishaka  in  administrative  ability  and  in  military 
talent.§  With  the  accession  of  King  Cetewayo,  the  son  of 
Panda,  Zululand  was  bidding  fair  to  rise  again  from  the 
condition  in  which  his  uncles  Mhlangana  and  Dingaan,  and 
his  father  Panda,  had  thrown  it,  to  the  condition  at  which 
his  mighty  uncle  Chaka  had  left  it.y  But  the  days  of  Zulu 
Independence  were  numbered,  and  the  Zulu  Kingdom  suc- 
cumbed before  the  attack  of  her  powerful  enemies  the 
British  and  the  Boer.1I 

We  do  not  propose  to  treat  here  of  the  Liberian 
Republic.  We  reserve  it  for  the  next  chapter,  where  it 
can  be  dealt  with  at  greater  length. 

From  Africa  we  pass  on  to  the  Independent  Americo- 
Ethiopian  Republic  of  Hayti,  and  of  it  we  must  say  a  few 
words.     Everybody  knows  how  the  Haytians  rose  in  insur- 

*  '  Encyclopaedia  Britannica,'  vol.  xxiv.,  pp.  828,  829. 

t  Ibid  X  Ibid.  §  Ibid  II  Ibid  IT  Ibid. 


m 


AFRICA  GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS.      233 

ection  in  August,  1791,  under  their  leaders  Jean  Fran9ois 
and  Biasson,  and  defied  the  might  of  France.  Everybody 
knows  also  that  when  Toussaint  the  Great  put  himself  at 
the  head  of  the  army  of  his  Haytian  countrymen  in  1793, 
within  a  comparatively  short  space  of  time  he  became  the 
Liberator  of  San  Domingo.  How  he  was  treacherously 
seized  by  perfidious  Frenchmen ;  how  he  was  conveyed  to 
France  a  close  prisoner,  and  how  he  perished,  almost  of 
starvation,  in  1803,  in  a  cold  Alpine  dungeon,  are  matters 
of  history.  The  Government  of  Toussaint  the  Great  was 
firm,  wise,  and  progressive,  and  under  Toussaint  the  Great 
the  Haytians  were  prosperous,  thriving,  and  wealthy. 
'  Under  his  government  the  Island  was  restored  to  more 
than  its  former  prosperity.'  The  indefatigable  Emperor 
Jacques  I.  (Dessalines)  continued  the  struggle  for  Haytian 
Independence,  and  the  Frenchmen,  after  suffering  punish- 
ment at  his  hands,  yielded  to  his  conquering  arms.  After 
he  drove  Frenchmen  from  his  country,  the  Island  of  San 
Domingo,  Britishers  and  Spaniards  tried  hard  to  reduce 
the  Haytians  under  their  yoke,  but  they  were  prevented 
by  the  might  of  Dessalines,  and  were  driven  into  the  sea. 
Who  is  there  who  does  not  know  that  Hayti  flourished 
under  the  Imperial  Government  of  Jacques  I.  ?  Hayti  was 
also  happy  and  contented  under  the  Emperor  Henri  I. 
(Christophe),  and  under  Presidents  Petion,  Boyer  (who 
governed  Hayti  or  San  Domingo  for  thirty-one  or  more 
years),  Boisrond  Canal,  Geffrard  Solomon,  the  Emperor 
Faustin  I.  (Soulouque),  Salmave,  while  we  have  proved 
that  Hayti  is  now  flourishing,  having  a  capable,  wise, 
and  vigorous  Government,  under  the  headship  of  the 
President,  General  L.  M.  F.  Hippolyte.  When,  therefore, 
the  Times  Commissioner  deliberately  quotes  Ethelbert 
Barksdale,  who  in  his  turn  quotes  'the  language  of  a 
Northern   statesmen   and   Union   soldier,'    that   ' "  in   the 


234  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

whole  historic  period  of  the  world  the  Ethiopian  race  had 
never  established  or  maintained  a  Government  for  them- 
selves,'" not  only  Laird  Clowes,  but  the  other  gentleman 
referred  to,  say  not  only  what  is  erroneous  and  misleading, 
but  they  display  a  sad  ignorance  of  African  history. 

Laird  Clowes,  on  pages  158,  159,  of  his  '  Black  America,' 
quotes  James  Anthony  Froude,  who  writes  in  '  The  English 
in  the  West  Indies ' : 

'  There  is  a  saying  in  Hayti  that  the  white  man  has  no 
rights  which  the  blacks  are  bound  to  recognise.  .  .  .  They 
can  own  no  freehold  property,  and  exist  only  on  tolerance. 
They  are  called  "white  trash."  Black  Dukes  and  Mar- 
quises drive  over  them  in  the  street,  and  swear  at  them. 
.  .  .  Englishmen  move  about  Jacmel  as  if  they  were 
ashamed  of  themselves  among  their  dusky  lords  and 
masters.  The  presence  of  the  European  in  any  form  is 
barely  tolerated.' 

Apart  from  the  fact  that  the  statement  that  'there  is  a 
saying  in  Hayti  that  the  white  man  has  no  rights  which 
the  blacks  are  bound  to  recognise,'  and  that  '  they  can  own 
no  freehold  property,  and  exist  only  on  tolerance,'  as  made 
by  James  Anthony  Froude  and  by  W.  Laird  Clowes,  is 
questionable,  and  will  not  bear  investigation ;  it  is,  pro- 
bably, the  reverse  of  the  truth.  If  that  be  as  they  are 
trying  to  make  out,  then  we  say  that  there  is  nothing 
strange  or  peculiar  about  foreigners  not  being  allowed  to 
own  freehold  property  in  the^  country  of  the  Haytians.  It 
is  not  unusual;  it  is  not  unique.  Were  not  foreigners 
incapacitated  from  holding  landed  property  in  the  British 
Isles  until  so  late  as  the  year  1870?  It  was  the  Naturaliza- 
tion Act  of  1870,  the  33rd  and  34th  Statute  of  the  Reign 
of  Victoria,  chapter  xiv.,  which  removed  many  of  the  dis- 
abilities that  aliens  were  labouring  under  in  Britain.  Even 
now  it  is  still  impossible  for  an  alien  to  own  a  British  ship, 


AFRICA  GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS.      235 

while  he  cannot  hold  shares,  or  be  trustee  of  shares,  in  a 
British  ship."^ 

What  could  be  more  singular,  more  unjust,  and  more 
severe  and  arbitrary  than  that  on  the  death  of  every 
foreigner  who  had  any  property  in  France,  that  property 
was  confiscated  to  the  French  crown,  in  accordance  with 
the  provisions  of  the  Droit  d^Aubaine?  But  that  is  now 
done  away  with,  to  the  credit  of  Frenchmen.  All  foreigners 
were  labouring  under  disabilities  in  Germany,  Austro- 
Hungary,  Italy^  Russia,  Denmark,  Holland,  Spain,  and  in 
other  countries  of  Europe,  and  in  the  United  States  of 
North  America,  before  i860  or  thereabout,  and  were  for- 
bidden to  hold  landed  property  therein,  or,  if  they  did,  were 
confiscated  to  the  State  in  which  the  property  was  situate. 

Boyd's  Third  Edition  of  Wheaton's  '  International  Law,' 
pp.  132,  133,  says:  *It  is  only  of  late  years  that  the  right 
of  holding  lands  on  the  same  conditions  as  subjects  has 
been  conceded  to  foreigners  by  most  countries.  In  Belgium 
this  was  effected  by  the  law  of  the  27th  of  April,  1865. 
Russia!  conceded  the  privilege  in  i860.  Some  of  the  Swiss 
cantons  do  not  even  now  permit  foreigners  to  hold  real 
property  without  the  express  permission  of  the  Cantonal 
Government,  unless  there  be  a  treaty  to  that  effect.  Austria, 
the  Netherlands,  and  Sweden  only  accord  the  right  on  con- 
dition of  reciprocity  in  the  foreigner's  country.  The  con- 
stitution of  the  German  Empire  provides  that  every  person 
belonging  to  one  of  the  confederated  States  is  to  be  treated 

■^  33  and  34  Vic,  c.  14  ;  Underhill's  '  Trusts,'  p.  361. 

t  But  Lloyd's  News  for  November  15th,  1891,  says  that  'The 
local  [Warsaw]  press  announces  that  a  law  will  shortly  be 
levelled  at  foreign  colonization  of  the  Russian  steppes,  making 
the  acquisition  of  farms  and  holdings  by  alien  settlers  illegal  in 
future,  and  compelling  such  settlers  as  have  already  acquired 
grants  of  land  to  become  Russian  subjects  within  three  years.' 


236  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

in  every  other  of  the  confederated  States  as  a  born  native, 
and  to  be  permitted  to  acquire  real  estate.  But,  as  regards 
other  countries,  the  laws  of  Bavaria,  Prussia,  Saxony,  and 
Wurtemburg  exact  for  their  own  subjects,  when  abroad,  the 
same  rights  they  extend  to  foreigners  in  their  own  dominions. 
In  Italy,  Denmark,  and  Greece  aliens  are  under  no  disa- 
bilities in  this  respect.  The  ownership  of  land  in  the 
United  States  is  regulated  by  the  laws  of  each  individual 
State  of  the  Union.  Some  of  the  States  impose  no  re- 
strictions on  foreigners ;  others  require  residence  and  an 
oath  of  allegiance ;  in  others  a  declaration  of  an  intention 
to  become  a  naturalized  citizen  of  the  United  States  is 
necessary.  Feudal  principles  were  maintained  so  long  in 
Britain,  that  until  the  year  1870  an  alien  was  incapable  of 
holding  land  for  more  than  twenty-one  years ;  that  is,  he 
could  not  purchase  a  freehold.  This,  however,  was  remedied 
by  the  Naturalization  Act,  1870  (33  and  34  Vic,  c.  14), 
which  relieved  aliens  of  most  of  their  disabilities,  and,  as 
regards  land,  placed  them  on  the  same  footing  as  [British] 
subjects.'  The  French,  however,  were  the  first  to  break 
through  ancient  prejudices  in  respect  of  foreigners,  and  to 
set  the  example  of  a  more  liberal  and  enlightened  legis- 
lation, by  removing  many  of  the  disabilities  aliens  were 
labouring  under  in  France  prior  to  1791.^  The  British 
formed  a  treaty  with  the  Yankees  in  the  years  the  Natural- 
ization Acts  (33  and  34  Vic,  c  14,  and  35  and  36  Vic, 
c.  39),  1870  and  1872,  were  passed,  permitting  the  Yankees, 
if  they  felt  so  inclined,  to  hold  property  and  have  other 
rights  in  the  British  Isles  and  their  dependencies,  whilst 
the  Yankees,  in  their  turn,  were  to  concede  the  same 
privileges  to  British  subjects.  Yet  it  is  strange  that  no 
Canadian  can  own  a  Yankee  ship  as  a  British  subject; 
only  if  he  (the  Canadian)  consents  to  become  a  Yankee, 
*  Lord  Chief  Justice  Cockburn's  /  Nationality,' pp.  152-160. 


AFRICA   GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS.       237 

under  the  protection  of  the  Stars  and  Stripes,  will  he  be 
qualified  to  own  a  Yankee  ship.  What  is  more  severe  than 
that  the  captain  of  every  vessel,  on  arriving  in  the  British 
Isles,  is  bound  to  furnish  a  list  of  all  his  passengers  who 
are  foreigners ;  and  non-compliance  with,  and  infringement 
of,  this  rule  is  visited  with  a  heavy  fine  ? 

Even  amongst  themselves  Britishers  are  unjust  and 
severe. 

What  can  be  more  unjust  or  more  severe  in  this  nineteenth 
century  than  that,  whilst  Englishmen  and  Scotsmen  have 
each  a  volunteer  force,  Irishmen  can  have  none  in  Ireland, 
though  they  can  be  volunteers  in  Scotland,  England,  and 
the  British  colonies?  Not  even  the  above  can  be  more 
unjust  or  more  severe  than  the  law  that,  whilst  no  Pro- 
testant, orthodox  Greek,  Jew,  Mahommedan,  Agnostic, 
Idolater,  Atheist,  is  debarred  from  the  office  of  Lord 
Chancellor  of  England,  and  from  the  Lord- Lieutenancy 
of  Ireland,  a  Catholic  is  disqualified  from  holding  either 
of  these  offices ;  and  this  condition  of  things  is  aggravated 
by  the  fact  that  the  majority  of  Irishmen  are  Catholics. 

To  return  to  the  Haytians.  We  say  that  it  is  not  a  fact 
that  whites  '  can  own  no  freehold  property,'  and  that  '  they 
exist  only  on  tolerance'  in  Hayti,  Froude  tells  us,  and 
Clowes  quotes  his  words,  that  '  Haytian  Dukes  and  Mar- 
quises drive  over  them'  (the  whites)  'in  the  street,  and 
swear  at  them.'  This  we  also  deny.  We  are  again  told 
that  '  Englishmen  move  about  Jacmel  as  if  they  were 
ashamed  of  themselves  among  their  dusky  lords  and 
masters.'  We  should  like  to  know  why  the  '  Englishmen 
who  move  about  Jacmel'  should  comport  themselves  'as 
if  they  were  ashamed  of  themselves.'  If  life  is  hard  for 
the  Caucasian  (the  Britisher)  to  bear  amongst  the  Haytians, 
why  does  he  not  take  his  departure  thence  ?  Why  should 
he  remain  in  a  place  that  is  irksome  to  him  ?     Why  does 


238  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  Englishman  continue  living  '  among  his  dusky  lords 
and  masters/  as  Froude  contemptuously  calls  the  noble 
Haytians,  when  he  'moves  about  Jacmel  as  if  he  were 
ashamed  of  himself? 

When  Britishers,  Caucasians,  take  up  their  abode  in 
Hayti,  it  must  or  it  ought  to  be  with  the  full  consciousness 
that  they  are  to  yield  full  allegiance  to  the  majesty  of  the 
Constitution  and  Laws  of  the  Haytians,  and  if  they  violate 
or  transgress  they  will  have  to  put  up  with  the  consequences 
which  their  infringement  entails ;  they  must  expect  that 
swift  and  effectual  punishment  will  be  meted  out  to  them 
by  the  Haytians,  as  it  would  were  they  in  their  own  country 
or  dwelling  amongst  any  other  civilized  people. 

Laird  Clowes,  on  pages  114,  115,  and  116,  referring  to 
the  criminality  of  the  United  States,  states  that  the 
American  African  is  many  times  more  prone  to  criminality 
than  his  white  countryman.  Of  course,  as  usual,  Laird 
Clowes  makes  a  statement  which  he  does  not  prove.  We 
all  know  that  there  are,  and  are  sure  to  be,  criminals  every- 
where, amongst  every  people.  Where  there  are  more 
Africans  than  Caucasians  in  the  United  States,  there  will 
be  more  African  than  Caucasian  criminals,  and  where  there 
are  more  Caucasians  than  Africans  there  will  be  more 
Caucasian  than  African  criminals. 

Whilst  Mr.  W.  Laird  Clowes,  in  one' part  of  his  book, 
speaks  disparagingly  of  the  '  material  position '  of  the 
Africo-American,  he  admits,  in  another  part  of  his  '  Black 
America,'  that  '  there  is  no  doubt  that  they  are  gradually 
acquiring  property,  and,  in  a  few  cases,  accumulating  capital. 
It  was  recently  declared  that  coloured  people  owned  a 
million  acres  of  land  in  Texas  alone,  paying  taxes  there  on 
twenty  million  dollars'  worth  of  property,  and  there  were  in 
the  State  twenty-five  coloured  lawyers,  one  hundred  coloured 
merchants,  five  thousand  coloured  mechanics,  and  fifteen 


AFRICA  GOVERNED  BY  THE  AFRICANS.      239 

newspapers  conducted  by  coloured  people.'  Add  to  all 
this,  that  there  are  not  half  as  many  Africans  in  Texas 
as  there  are  White  Americans,  and  the  fact  that  only 
twenty-eight  years  have  elapsed  since  the  American  African 
received  his  Emancipation.  Laird  Clowes  should  be  con- 
sistent, and  not  eccentric,  for  while  he  runs  the  African 
down  to  earth  in  one  page,  he  eulogizes  him  in  another. 

This  is  how  Laird  Clowes  eulogizes  the  Africo-American, 
by  quoting  a  journal  which  shows  that :  '  Georgia's  coloured 
people  are  making  a  good  record  for  thrift  and  industry. 
In  1879  their  property  was  valued  at  $5,128,398,  but  in 
1887  the  valuation  was  $8,939,479,  showing  a  gain  of  72J 
per  cent,  during  the  nine  years.  In  the  same  time  the 
valuation  of  white  men's  property  had  risen  from 
$229,777,150  to  $332,565,442,  a  gain  of  only  44-6  per 
cent,  approximately.  These  figures  simply  prove  what 
the  intelligent  representatives  of  the  Negro  race  have  said 
about  the  progress  made,  and  they  go  to  illustrate  anew  that 
the  Negroes  are  working  out  their  own  future.  The  richest 
coloured  woman  in  the  South,  Mrs.  Amanda  Ewas,  who  has 
a  snug  fortune  of  $400,000,  lives  in  Atlanta.' 

By  Clowes's  own  showing  this  is  the  hopeful  result  of  only 
some  twenty-eight  years  of  freedom. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

REPATRIATION    AND    LIBERIA. 

We  now  enter  on  our  last  chapter,  and  in  it  we  propose  to 
solve  the  African  Race  Problem  in  the  United  States. 

Like  the  Africans,  the  Honourable  Professor  Edward 
Wilmot  Blyden,  LL.D.,  ex-Liberian  Minister  to  the  Court 
of  St.  James's ;  the  Right  Reverend  Bishop  H.  M.  Turner, 
of  Atlanta,  Georgia ;  Dr.  H.  M.  Tupper,  of  Shaw  University, 
Raleigh,  North  Carolina ;  the  Rev.  Mr.  T.  S.  Lee,  of  Charles 
ton,  and  other  of  our  countrymen  and  kinsmen,  we  counsel 
emigration  from  America  and  immigration  into  Africa. 

Yes,  and  like  Laird  Clowes  we  say  there  must  be  another 
exodus  from  Egypt,  another  restoration  of  the  captive 
tribes.  But  what  part  of  Africa  shall  the  expatriated 
African  go  to  ?  Shall  it  be  to  a  country  in  Africa  where 
the  Caucasian  rules,  as  Laird  Clowes  suggests  ?  We  think 
not,  for  the  same  Race  Problem  which  is  puzzling  and 
agitating  the  United  States  would  soon  perplex  and  agitate 
that  country  where  the  10,500,000  of  American  Africans 
are  transported.  There  would  be  greater  race  jealousies 
than  ever  in  that  particular  country.  There  are  even  now 
race  jealousies  between  the  Caucasian  and  the  African, 
though  they  are  not  a  great  deal  talked  of  and  commented 
on  out  of  the  pale  where  they  exist,  which  is  wherever  the 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  241 

Caucasian  rules,  whether  it  be  in  Africa,  in  the  West  Indies, 
or  in  the  Americas. 

Laird  Clowes  lays  down  three  conditions  which  must  be 
offered  to  the  expatriated  African  in  order  to  accomplish 
his  removal,  and  he  suggests  that — 

(i)  The  emigrating  African  must  be  offered  a  country  in 
which  he  may  pursue  high  aims,  enjoy  a  prospect  of 
improved  political,  social,  and  financial  status^  and  find 
climate  and  employment  suited  to  his  needs. 

(2)  He  must  not  govern,  but  be  governed.  At  the  same 
time  he  must  not  be  oppressed,  either  physically  or  morally, 
and  there  must  be  no  restraint  upon  his  improvement  and 
advancement. 

(3)  His  emigration  must  be  assisted,  either  by  those  who 
owe  him  a  debt,  or  by  those  who  will  benefit  by  his  migra- 
tion, or  by  both. 

Whilst  agreeing  with  every  one  of  Laird  Clowes's  pro- 
positions, believing  them  to  be  sound  and  reasonable,  we 
must  take  exception  to  one  part  of  the  second  condition 
which  he  lays  down,  viz.,  that  '  He  (the  expatriated  African) 
must  not  govern,  but  be  governed,'  because  that  statement, 
to  say  the  least,  is  absurd  and  ridiculous,  being  based  on 
Ignorance  and  Prejudice. 

We  say,  in  our  turn,  and  with  emphasis,  that  the  ex- 
patriated African  must  not  be  governed,  hut  must  govern. 
He  must  be  independent,  as  his  forefathers,  '  the  Mighty 
Dead,'  were  before  him,  otherwise  the  Race  Question,  which 
is  now  preying  on  the  vitals  of  the  United  States  of  North 
America,  would  prey  on  the  vitals  of  the  particular  country 
where  our  expatriated  African  should  be  sent.  And  have  we 
not  proved  that  the  African  Ethiopian,  indigenously  civilized, 
was  able  to  govern  ?  Have  we  not  proved  that  the  African 
States  of  Assyria  or  Babylon,  Canaan  and  Phoenicia,  in  Asia 
have  flourished  ?     Have  we  not  proved  and  shown  that  the 

16 


242  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

indigenously  civilized  African  Negro  States  of  Carthage, 
Ethiopia,  Abyssinia,  Sokoto,  Gandu,  Bornu,  Zululand,  and 
others  have  flourished  and  have  been  mighty  empires? 
And  are  not  Liberia,  Hayti,  Morocco,  and  Abyssinia  all 
independent  African  States  that  are  flourishing  and  pro- 
gressing ?  Therefore  do  we  say  that  we  Africans  must 
govern  ourselves,  and  not  be  governed. 

Laird  Clowes  suggests  that  the  expatriated  African  in  the 
United  States  should  be  sent  to  the  Congo  Free  State  as 
*  the  country  in  which  he  may  pursue  high  aims,  enjoy  a 
prospect  of  improved  political,  social,  and  financial  status, 
and  find  climate  and  employment  suited  to  his  needs.' 
That  is  his  '  Ideal  Solution.'  But  we  say  that  no  man  could 
have  made  a  greater  blunder,  no  man  could  have  failed 
more  lamentably  in  solving,  or  rather  in  trying  to  solve, 
the  African  Race  Problem  in  America  than  Laird  Clowes 
does  in  suggesting  emigration  by  the  Africo- Americans  into 
the  Congo  Free  State.  An  '  Ideal  Solution '  indeed  !  Laird 
Clowes  has  not  only  failed,  but  blundered,  in  his  scheme 
for  solving  the  Race  Problem  in  the  Land  of  the  Yankees ; 
and  this  we  shall  endeavour  to  show,  taking  care  to  give 
reasons  for  our  '  Ideal  Solution '  of  the  difficulty. 

Our  '  Ideal  Solution '  will  be,  we  are  confident,  nothing 
unsound,  nothing  that  can  be  likened  to  the  fruit  of  the 
tree  which  grows  by  the  banks  of  the  Dead  Sea  :  it  will  be 
nothing  illusoiry,  nothing  incapable  of  realization,  as  is 
Laird  Clowes's  solution. 

We  now  propose  to  show  how  Laird  Clowes  has  failed 
and  blundered.  Their  transportation  from  the  United 
States  would  free  the  Caucasian  Yankees  from  the  incubus 
of  the  Americo-Africans,  it  is  true ;  but  it  is  not  less  true 
that  the  transplantation  and  repatriation  of  the  10,500,000 
of  Africo- Americans  into  Africa,  into  the  Congo  Free  State, 
would  give    rise   to   another   Race   Problem   in  the  latter 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA,  243 

country.  We  ask,  Are  not  the  rulers  of  the  Congo  Free 
State,  King  Leopold  II.  and  his  Belgians,  all  Caucasians, 
all  white  men  ?  Would  that  circumstance  not,  then,  occa- 
sion a  Race  Problem  in  the  Congo  Free  State  ? 

Yet  this  is  not  Laird  Clowes's  only  mistake  ;  he  has  com- 
mitted other  and  greater  blunders  by  suggesting  that  the 
Africans  in  the  United  States  should  make  the  Congo  Free 
State  their  home. 

We  ask,  Is  it  not  a  well-known  fact  that  the  official 
language  of  the  Congo  Free  State  is  the  official  language 
of  Belgium,  and  that  is  the  language  of  the  French,  and 
is  not  Flemish  also  an  official  language  in  the  Congo  Free 
State  as  it  is  an  official  and  the  national  language  of  Belgium  ? 
Can  the  Americo-Africans  speak  the  French  or  the  Flemish 
language  ?     If  there  are  those  who  do,  how  many  do  ? 

Laird  Clowes,  we  are  aware,  is  a  Britisher,  and,  like  the 
great  majority  of  his  countrymen,  he  cannot  be  said  to  be 
very  politic  and  judicious.  Is  it  not  the  prayer  and  the 
boast  of  every  Britisher,  and  his  Yankee  cousin,  that  the 
Anglo-Saxon  tongue  shall  and  must  become,  in  no  distant 
time,  the  prevailing  cosmopolitan  tongue  ?  We  ourselves 
believe  it  must  be  so. 

Yet  Laird  Clowes  and  Henry  Morton  Stanley,  of  Yam- 
buya  and  Manyuema  unenviable  notoriety,  forsooth  !  would 
send,  if  they  could,  the  Americo-Africans  into  the  Congo 
Free  State,  that  they  might  discard  the  Anglo-Saxon  tongue 
and  adopt  the  French  language  instead. 

We  ask.  Is  it  not  also  a  well-known  fact  that  the  Consti- 
tution of  the  Congo  Free  State,  while  it  agrees  with  that  of 
Belgium,  which  is  modelled  on  that  of  France,  differs  from 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  of  North  America — 
the  very  Constitution  which  the  Afro -Americans  are 
used  to? 

We  ask  again,  Is  it  of  no  moment  that  the  headship  of 

16 — 2 


244  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  Congo  Free  State  is  filled  by  a  King  who  is  the  King 
of  the  Belgians  also?  And  are  not  the  10,500,000  Americo- 
Africans  in  the  United  States  of  North  America  all  repub- 
licans to  a  man  ?  Why  should  we  not  also  ask,  Is  it  not  a 
well-known  fact  that  the  Belgian  rulers  of  the  Congo  Free 
State  brutally  ill-treat  the  Congoes,  and  hold  them  in  a 
condition  of  servitude  ?  Is  it  false  to  say  that  the  Congo 
Free  State  is  at  a  standstill  and  non-progressive  under  the 
sickly  and  incompetent  Belgian  Administration  sitting  at 
Boma? 

So  much  so  that  Belgian  Leopold  and  his  Janssen 
Administration  of  the  Congo  Free  State,  tormented  by  the 
zymotic  disease  of  incompetency  and  incapability,  sent 
envoys  in  1884  and  1889  to  the  United  States  of  North 
America,  praying  that  they  might  be  allowed  to  take  as 
many  Africans  as  were  willing  to  go,  and  whose  services 
they  were  able  to  pay  for,  to  the  Congo  Free  State,  to  act 
as  an  antiseptic,  and  a  panacea  for  the  Belgian  maladies 
in  their  maladministration  of  the  Congo  Free  State  ? 

Surely  Laird  Clowes  cannot  be  serious  when  he  proposes 
to  send  the  Americo-Africans  to  the  Congo  Free  State,  a 
State  where  the  rulers  are  whites ;  a  State  where  the  official 
language  is  French  ;  a  State  where  the  Constitution  (in- 
cluding the  Laws)  is  Belgic  French,  and  the  Chief  Magis- 
trate a  King ;  a  State  where  the  African  is  ill-treated  and 
slavery  exists ;  a  State  which,  because  its  rulers  are  in- 
competent and  incapable,  is  at  a  standstill  and  non- 
progressive. 

Would  Laird  Clowes  have  the  Americo-Africans  killed 
by  inches  or  killed  outright  ? 

Were  the  Africans  in  the  American  Union  to  leave  the 
United  States  for  the  Congo  Free  State,  they  would  be 
quitting  the  frying-pan  to  get  into  the  fire. 

These  are,  then.  Laird  Clowes's  blunders. 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA. 

With  the  Congo  Free  State  backward  and  in  every  way 
unsuitable  for  the  Africc-American,  where  must  he  betake 
himself,  since  he  is  oppressed  in  the  United  States  ?  As  he 
must  necessarily  be  independent,  so  as  to  steer  clear  of  all 
Race  Problems,  where  must  he  go  to  ? 

Though  Africa  is  almost  partitioned,  and  under  the  so- 
called  sphere  of  influence  of  Britain,  France,  Germany, 
Italy,  Spain,  and  Portugal,  yet  there  is  room  for  not  only 
the  Americo-Africans,  the  West  In  do- Africans,  but  for  all 
other  African  expatriates,  in  that  very  continent. 

We  propose  to  send  all  Africans  who  are  living  out  of 
Africa,  and  who  are  willing  to  go,  to  the  Independent 
Republic  of  Liberia.  This  is  the  country  all  Africans 
except  the  Haytians  should  go  to.  We  have  shown  why  the 
Africo-American  should  not  be  sent  to  the  Congo  Free 
State.  Now  we  propose  to  show  why  the  returning  exile 
should  march  into  Liberia. 

The  expatriated  African  must  not  be  sent  to  that  part 
of  Africa  where  the  Caucasian  rules,  for  then  there  would 
arise  a  Race  Problem  of  higher  dimensions  and  of  a  more 
virulent  type  than  is  perplexing  the  United  States  of  North 
America,  and  that  is  undesirable. 

The  expatriated  African  must  not  be  sent  to  some  country 
in  Africa  where  the  aboriginal  inhabitants  are  not  only  inde- 
pendent, but  have  never  come  into  contact  with  Cauca- 
sian civilization,  and  particularly  where  the  white  man 
has  not  been  seen  ;  for  the  returning  exile  would  have  an 
uphill  work  in  his  attempt  to  subdue  the  African  aborigines, 
and  that  is  also  undesirable. 

It  is  also  undesirable  that  the  expatriated  and  civilized 
African  (civilized  under  Caucasian  influence)  should  have 
an  independent  country  of  his  own  other  than  Liberia,  for 
the  obvious  reason  that  division,  no  matter  in  what  form,  is 
always  weakness. 


246  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Did  not  the  Magyars  easily  conquer  Hungary,  because 
Hungary  and  Europe  were  divided  amongst  themselves  ? 
These  same  now  dwell  in  and  possess  the  land  they  conquered 
centuries  ago.  Did  not  the  Turkish  Mussulmans  easily 
crush  and  pull  to  pieces  the  moribund  Eastern  Roman- 
Greek  Empire  ?  And  what  was  it  that  accelerated  the 
success  of  the  conquering  Osmanli  Crescent  ?  Was  it  not 
the  fact  that  Europe  was  divided  against  itself,  and  so  was 
impotent  to  help  the  Greeks?  And  are  not  the  Turks, 
though,  like  the  Magyars,  an  Asiatic  race,  still  in  Europe  ? 

The  Moors  pounced  upon  Hispania  and  Lusitania  in 
710;  and  because  the  rest  of  Europe  was  hopelessly 
divided,  and  because  dissension  and  bickerings  reigned 
supreme  among  the  Spaniards  and  the  Portuguese,  their 
subjugation  by  the  omnipotent  Moors  was  not  a  hard  task, 
but  was  easily  accomplished,  the  turbulent  and  fratricidal 
Spaniards  and  Portuguese  experiencing  violent  shocks  and 
disastrous  defeats  at  the  hands  of  the  conquering  Moors 
when  they  took  the  field  and  joined  battle  with  their 
enemies. 

We  repeat  again  that  every  sort  of  division  is  weakening 
to  a  nation,  and  is  to  be  deprecated. 

The  African  race  is  already,  unfortunately,  too  widely 
scattered  apart,  and  we  Africans  must  concentrate,  as  much 
as  possible,  those  of  our  race  who  are  able  and  willing  to  be 
concentrated.  All  Africans,  therefore,  who  have  the  welfare 
of  their  race  at  heart  rejoice  and  seek  consolation  in  the 
fact,  that  the  Mexicans  and  Argentines  protested,  in  1889 
or  thereabout,  against  the  projected  settlement  of  the 
Africans  in  America  in  their  respective  countries.  The 
protest  by  the  Mexicans  and  Argentines  threw  cold  water 
on  the  American  African  Colonization  Scheme,  and  for 
this  we  sincerely  thank  the  Mexicans  and  Argentines. 

The  Americo- Africans  would,  forsooth!  quit  the  United 


I 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  247 

States  of  North  America,  and  settle  in  Mexico  or  Argentina, 
leaving  their  Africa  and  their  Liberia  neglected.     Is  Liberia 
our  Liberia,  the  Pride  and  Hope  of  Africa,  and  of  true- 
born  and  true-hearted  Africans,  such  a  scarecrow  that  Mexico 
or  Argentina  should  be  preferred  ?     We  are  glad,  we  say 
again,  that  the  Mexicans  and  Argentines  absolutely  refused 
to  receive  the  Africo-Americans  in  their  respective  countries. 
May  they  do  so  again  if  another  opportunity  presents  itself! 
Division  is  weakness,  we  say.     Christianity,  though  the 
true  religion,  and  though  professed  by  the  great  majority  of 
civilized  humanity,  is  despised  and  ridiculed  by  the  believers 
in   the   Law   of    Moses,  by  Islamism,  by   Hindooism,  by 
Brahminism,  by  Buddhism,   by  Atheism — and  why  ?     Be- 
cause these  latter,  these  non-Christians  (though  they  fail  to 
see   how    hopelessly   divided    and    faction-torn    they    are 
amongst  themselves),   with  truth,  with  emphasis,  and  with 
the  pointed  finger  of  scorn,  say  to  one  another  :  *  See  how 
these  Christians  love  one  another  !      See   how   they    are 
always  ready  to  tear  one  another  to  pieces,  and  they,  for- 
sooth !  would  fain  preach  to  us  on  our  ways  and  forms  of 
worship  !' 

The  fact  that  the  Christian  Religion  is  divided  and  split 
up  into  three  great  branches — Catholicity,  Greek  Orthodoxy, 
and  Protestantism — without  the  shadow  of  a  doubt  places 
it  at  a  disadvantage  when  it  has  to  deal  with  non-Christians, 
and  prevents  us  Christians  from  reclaiming  and  converting 
the  heathen,  the  non-Christian,  from  his  evil  ways  and 
practices. 

In  bygone  ages  Protestants  fought  Catholics  and  Catholics 
Protestants,  while  the  enmity  and  jealousy  between  these 
last  two,  and  also  between  Catholicism  and  the  Greek 
Orthodox  Church,  still  flicker,  their  traces  being  evident 
enough  amongst  Caucasians.  But  we  Africans,  a  truly 
sensible  and  non-bigoted  race,  never  had,  have  not,  and 


248  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

never  shall  have,  such  religious  enmities  and  jealousies  as 
have  existed,  still  obtain,  and,  we  fear,  will  always  obtain, 
amongst  Caucasians  up  to  the  consummation  of  the  world. 

So  much  for  religious  divisions. 

To  turn  to  secular  divisions — to  return  to  the  point  which 
we  have  left — we  assert  that  it  is  undesirable  that  the  civil- 
ized and  subject  African  should  have  any  independent 
country  of  his  own,  either  in  or  out  of  Africa,  other  than 
Liberia.  Some  day  the  Liberians  and  the  new  would-be 
independent  Africans  may  fall  to  fighting  one  another,  and 
the  object  of  the  fighting  may  be  the  headship  of  the  whole 
or  part  of  Africa. 

The  world  and  Europe  saw,  in  1866,  the  Hohenzollern 
German  hurling  his  marshalled  hosts  at  the  embattled 
squadrons  of  his  cousin,  the  Hapsburg  German ;  but  it  was 
the  crushing  and  decisive  defeat  at  Sadowa  which  gave  the 
headship  of  Germany  to  the  Prussian  Hohenzollern,  driving 
away  the  crestfallen  Austro-Hungarian  Hapsburg  from  the 
leadership  and  membership  of  the  Germanic  Confederation. 

Liberia  must  never  have  to  measure  arms  with,  and  rush 
to  the  contest  with,  a  kindred  and  civilized  country  that 
may  be  its  neighbour  in  Africa,  speaking  the  same  language 
with  the  Liberians. 

Did  not  Britishers  and  Yankees,  though  cousins,  carry 
on  war  one  against  the  other  in  1812-1814?  When 
Napoleon  the  Great  issued  his  Berlin  and  Milan  decrees 
against  Britishers,  and  all  Europe  except  Britain  and  Russia 
lay  humbled  at  his  feet,  and  slavishly  obeyed  the  French- 
man's behest,  did  the  Americans  in  any  way  help  their 
British  cousins  in  their  need?  Instead,  they  obeyed  the  order 
of  Napoleon,  and  gave  battle  to  the  British  in  1812-1814. 

The  Yankees  in  1846  snatched  the  '  Oregon  country,' 
and  in  187 1  wrung  millions  of  dollars  from  their  British 
cousins  because  of  the  *  Alabama'  and  '  Florida.' 


RE  PA  TRIA  TION  A  ND  LIBERIA .  249 

Even  now  Britishers  and  Yankees  are  not  as  friendly  as 
they  ought  to  be.  Jonathan  envies  his  cousin  of  Britain 
the  possession  of  British  North  America,  the  Dominion  of 
Canada  portion  particularly,  and  is  longingly  looking 
forward  to  the  day  when  he  will  be  able  to  wrest  it,  by  a 
coup  de  main  or  otherwise,  from  the  tenacious  grasp  of  his 
British  cousin,  John  Bull. 

Do  not  Britishers  also  envy  the  Yankees  their  possession 
of  Alaska  ?  Are  not  Britishers  and  Yankees  always  wrangling 
over  the  pearl  fishery  off  Alaska  ?  When  will  the  '  burning ' 
Behring  Sea  question  be  solved  ? 

We  maintain  that  the  unity,  the  federation,  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  Race  is  as  far-off  as  ever,  the  claims  of  Britain 
and  the  United  States  being  hopelessly  irreconcilable? 
Are  not  Frenchmen  more  or  less  jealous  of  the  French- 
speaking  Belgian  Leopold  for  having  the  headship  of  the 
Congo  Free  State. 

Again,  take  Spanish  America,  in  a  first  instance.  Did 
not  Argentina  and  Uruguay,  although  professing  the  same 
religion,  although  having  a  common  derivation  and  the 
same  nationality,  although  speaking  the  same  language  with 
her  (Paraguay),  with  the  co-operation  and  under  the  leader- 
ship of  Lusitanian  Brazil,  wage  fierce  and  long-continued 
war  from  1865  to  1872  with  her,  and  finally,  and  as  the 
outcome  of  the  humiliating  and  disastrous  defeats  she 
experienced  at  their  hands,  strip  Paraguay  of  an  enormous 
slice  of  territory  and  impose  upon  her  a  heavy  national 
debt  as  war  indemnity  ? 

In  a  second  instance,  did  not  Chili,  although  professing 
the  same  religion,  although  boasting  a  common  origin  and 
the  same  nationality,  although  speaking  a  common  language 
with  her  sister-neighbours,  declare  war  upon  Peru  and 
Bolivia  on  April  5,  1872,  and,  after  the  infliction  of  sundry 
and  paralyzing   defeats    on    the    Peruvian    and   Bolivian 


250  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

soldados,  and  in  the  pride  of  victory,  tear  huge  slices  of 
territory  from  their  grasp,  Bolivia  losing  her  only  seaport, 
Antofagasta,  in  1884  to  her  conqueror,  exultant  Chili,  the 
land  which  boasts  of  having  given  birth  to  Juan  San  Martin 
de  Jose,  the  comrade  and  brother-in-arms  of  the  British 
Cochrane,  Scottish  Dundonald,  who,  next  to  his  country- 
man, the  British  Nelson,  was  the  greatest  admiral  who  ever 
saw  the  light ;  while  the  equally  crestfallen  and  equally 
unfortunate  Peru  was  forced  to  relinquish  absolutely,  on  the 
20th  of  October,  1883,  the  rich  province  of  Tarapaca,  as 
well  as  to  conditionally  yield  fertile  Tacna  and  mellifluous 
Arica  to  her  Chilian  conquistadores  ? 

In  a  third  instance,  did  not  San  Salvador  and  Guatemala, 
although  speaking  the  same  language,  although  having  the 
same  origin  and  a  common  ancestry,  although  professing  the 
same  religion,  war  upon  each  other,  the  Salvadorian  and  the 
Guatemalan  rushing  to  the  shock  of  the  contest  and  meeting 
each  other  in  deadly  embraces  in  fair  and  open  field  in 
1890-1891 ? 

But  these  are  not  the  only  instances.  The  Columbian 
Confederation — which  the  Libertador,  Venezuelan  Simon 
Bolivar,  founded  in  18 19,  and  which  formerly  consisted  of 
Columbia,  Venezuela,  and  Ecuador — was  dissolved  in 
1829-1830  ;  but  what  has  been  the  outcome  of  the  untying  of 
that  knot,  of  that  separation  or  dissolution  ?  Their  separa- 
tion or  dissolution  from  one  another,  we  say,  has  caused 
the  so-called  Republics  of  Venezuela,  Colombia,  and 
Ecuador  to  sink  considerably  in  the  estimation  of  civilized 
humanity.  They  all  three  are  periodically  subject  to 
revolutionary  changes  and  internecine,  and  therefore 
suicidal,  strifes. 

Because  the  Government  of  each  has  been  and  is  incom- 
petent and  extravagant,  the  three  Republics  have  been  and  are 
mismanaged  and  misgoverned,  their  commerce  has  suffered 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  251 

and  is  suffering,  heavy  debts  have  been  and  are  being  con- 
tracted, their  population  has  thinned  and  is  thinning,  their 
armies  teem  with  '  generals,'  who  outnumber  the  soldados, 
and  who  (the  *  generals ')  delight  to  fight  with  their  tongues 
only,  and  whose  swords,  having  never  been  unsheathed, 
are,  as  a  consequence,  quite  innocent  of  blood. 

And,  to  make  matters  worse,  those  three  so-called  Repub- 
lics, Venezuela,  Colombia,  and  Ecuador,  have  been  for 
years  wrangling  with  one  another  as  to  their  respective 
boundaries,  i.e.,  to  the  east  of  Colombia,  the  west  of 
Venezuela  and  the  north  of  Ecuador,  and  south  of  Colombia. 
Such  are  the  fruits  of  disunion  and  separation  or  division  on 
the  part  of  kindred  and  sisterly  States. 

More.  Were  Colombia  and  Ecuador  united  with  Venez- 
uela, I.e.,  were  they  members  of  the  Colombian  Confedera- 
tion which  existed  in  1 829-1 830,  would  Britain  continue 
bullying,  if  not  harassing,  Venezuela,  with  respect  to  the 
Britannico-Venezuelan  Guinese  boundary  debateable  ? 

We  trow  not ;  for  Venezuela,  as  a  member  of  the  Colom- 
bian Confederation,  would  have  had  Colombia  and  Ecuador 
at  her  back  as  allies  and  as  sharers  in  the  national  interest 
and  danger,  and  in  the  defence  of  the  common  Fatherland. 
And  does  not  Punton  fait  la  force  against  all  outsiders  and 
oppressors  ?  The  Colombian  and  the  Ecuadorian  would 
have  been  a  par  nobile  fratrum  to  the  Venezuelan.  But 
disunion  or  division  or  separation  is,  as  a  rule,  weakness. 

Honest  and  well-meaning  men  like  the  American  Coloni- 
zation Society  and  Liberian  Professor  Blyden  will  sometimes 
say  things  which  on  second  thoughts  they  would  not  say. 

Liberian  Blyden,  in  his  book  '  Christianity,  Islam,  and 
the  Ethiopian  Race,'  would  scatter  the  Africo- Americans  in 
different  parts  of  Africa.  And  in  his  pamphlet,  '  The  Return 
of  the  Exiles  and  the  West  African  Church,'  p.  23,  he  says  : 
'  Imagine  the  result  of  one  hundred  thousand  Africans  from 


252  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

America  settled  in  the  Yoruba  country,  with  their  know- 
ledge of,  and  practice  in,  the  use  not  only  of  the  implements 
of  peace,  but  of  the  implements  of  war.'  To  us  such  a 
proposal  or  imagination  seems  unwise.  Because  Caucasians 
are  scattered,  Liberian  Blyden  would  further  scatter  the 
already  widely-scattered  Ethiopians,  forgetful  of  the  fact  that 
in  his  '  Christianity,  Islam,  and  the  Ethiopian  Race,'  p.  429, 
he  tells  the  Yankees  '  not  to  wait  until  they  have  trained 
the  Africo- Americans  to  their  ideal — in  their  peculiar  modes 
of  thifiking.  They  cafinot  make  them  Anglo-Saxons.  They 
never  will  make  them  so  in  spirit  a?id  possibilities,  if  I  inter- 
pret the  providence  of  God  aright.'  And,  despite  this,  he 
would  scatter  the  English-speaking  Africans ;  is  it  because 
the  Anglo-Saxons  are  scattered?  But  the  Anglo-Saxons 
are  now  studying  concentration.  Witness  the  Imperial  and 
Colonial  Institute  and  Imperial  Federation.  What  we  think 
a  distinguished  and  talented  man  like  Liberian  Blyden 
'  should  imagine,'  or  rather  work  for,  is  the  unity  and  con- 
centration of  the  Ethiopian  race — at  least,  the  English- 
speaking  portion  of  it.  If  a  brilliant  man  like  Liberian 
Dr.  Blyden  cannot  be  a  Guiseppe  Garibaldi,  he  can  be  a 
Camillo  Benso  di  Cavour  or  a  Guiseppe  Mazzini.  We  do 
not  want  a  man  who  will  scatter,  but  one  who  will  unite,  the 
already  scattered  race.  Let  a  talented  man  like  Liberian 
Blyden  unite  the  Ethiopian  race  in  Liberia.  The  American 
Colonization  Society,  in  its  seventy-fourth  annual  report 
(January,  1891),  page  11,  says  :  *  It  appears  to  us  that  the 
most  comprehensive,  far-reaching,  and  productive  plan  for 
bringing  that  vast  continent  within  the  operation  of  civiliza- 
tion and  under  the  influence  of  Christianity  would  be  to 
scatter  and  to  settle  four  millions,  or  about  one-half  of  the 
African  population  of  this  country,  in  the  land  of  their 
fathers.  Place  a  million  in  Liberia,  a  million  in  the  Niger 
districts  and  Yorubaland,  which  latter  country  seems  now 


REPA  TRIA TION  AND  LIBERIA.  253 

open  to  receive  them,  a  million  on  the  Congo,  and  a  million 
in  East  Africa.' 

With  all  due  respect  and  deference  to  the  organization 
which  has  done,  and  is  doing,  the  Ethiopian  race  such 
yeoman  services,  we  must  beg  leave  to  hurl  our  unqualified 
protest  against  that  proposition  of  the  American  Coloniza- 
tion Society. 

Members  of  the  American  Colonization  Society  and 
Liberian  Dr.  Blyden,  are  you  unaware  that  the  present  ten- 
dency of  the  European  and  Yankee  world  is  towards  con- 
centration? Have  you  never  heard  of  General  Count 
Ignatieff  and  Panslavism  ?  Have  you  never  heard  of 
M.  Delyannis  and  Panhellenism  ?  Have  you  never  heard 
of  British  Imperial  Federation,  Australasian  Federation,  and 
— tell  it  not  in  Oath  and  proclaim  it  not  in  the  streets  of 
Ascalon!  —  Anglo-Saxon  Confederation,  which  would  in- 
clude the  United  States?  British  Imperial  Federation, 
like  Panslavism  and  Panhellenism,  is  both  possible  and 
probable.  But  while  it  is  possible,  Anglo-Saxon  Confedera- 
tion is  improbable.  Two  kings,  or,  rather,  queens,  of 
Brentford,  like  Colombia  and  Britannia,  cannot  sit  on  the 
same  throne.  Were  Britain  and  America,  however,  united, 
what  European  power  would  dare  draw  the  sword  without 
the  Anglo-Saxon's  consent  ? 

But  Lord  North  has  prevented  what  might  and  could 
have  been,  to  the  exceeding  joy  of  Frenchmen,  Russians, 
and  other  rivals  of  Britishers. 

Members  of  the  American  Colonization  Society  and 
Liberian  Blyden,  are  you  forgetful  of  the  fact  that  Germany, 
like  the  United  Kingdom  and  France,  is  now  united  ?  Are 
you  unaware  that  united  and  regenerated  Italy  is  the  work 
of  Guiseppe  Garibaldi,  Camillo  Benso  di  Cavour,  and  last, 
not  least,  Guiseppe  Mazzini  ?  We  ask  you,  Could  not 
Russia  and  Austro-Hungary  pour  their  legions,  and  snatch 


254  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

portions  of  Africa  like  other  European  nations  ?  You  will 
agree  with  us  that  they  could  do  so  if  they  chose.  Surely, 
if  Italy,  Spain,  Portugal,  and  Belgium  can  be  in  Africa, 
mighty  empires  like  the  Russian  and  Austro-Hungarian 
could  be  there  too  if  they  chose.  But  these  modern 
Augustuses  are  wise  in  their  generation  ;  they  know  that 
division  is  weakness,  and  are  engaged  in  the  work  of  con- 
centration and  consolidation. 

We  would  ask  the  xA.merican  Colonization  Society  and 
Dr.  Blyden,  Would  Texas  have  been  so  easily  annexed  in 
1845  by  President  Polk,  the  defeats  of  Palo  Alto,  Resaca 
de  la  Palma,  and  Buena  Vista  inflicted  on  the  countrymen 
of  Iturbide,  Santa  Annae,  and  Porfirio  Diaz  by  Yankee 
Taylor  so  crushing  and  humiliating,  the  State  of  California 
and  territories  of  Utah,  Arizona,  and  New  Mexico  so  coolly 
ceded  by  the  Treaty  of  Guadalupe  Hidalgo  (1848)  to  the 
United  States  by  Mexico,  were  the  Spanish-speaking  states 
of  Central  and  South  America  united  and  allied  with  the 
latter  country  (Mexico)  }  Their  selfish  and  insatiable  greed 
for  the  sweets  of  power  will  one  day,  we  fear  as  much, 
enable  the  earth-eating  Yankees  to  easily  swallow  up  all  the 
Spanish  American  republics.  If  Spanish  America  were 
joined  to  Spain,  that  power  would  be  more  powerful  than 
it  is. 

The  Yankees  could  easily  carry  their  arms  into  the  bosom 
of  our  Africa  if  they  felt  so  inclined ;  but  the  dread  of  the 
weakness  of  division  and  the  power  of  unity  rather  than  the 
Monroe  doctrine  prevent  them  from  '  rushing  '  and  bleeding 
our  sorrow-stricken  and  unhappy  Africa  to  death. 

Have  the  American  Colonization  Society  forgotten  with 
what  determination  for  four  consecutive  years  their  sires  of 
the  North  fought  their  sires  of  the  South  ?  And  wherefore? 
Was  it  merely  because  of  Africo-American  slavery  ?  or  was 
it  rather  that  the  North  wished  to  retie  the  '  untied  '  states, 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  255 

to  save  and  maintain  the  Union?  That  pseudo-philan- 
thropist Yankee,  Abraham  Lincohi,  writing  on  August  22, 
1862,  said:  'My  paramount  object  is  to  save  the  Union, 
and  not  either  to  save  or  destroy  slavery.  If  I  could  save 
the  Union  without  freeing  any  slave,  I  would  do  it ;  if  I 
could  save  it  by  freeing  all  the  slaves,  I  woiild  do  it ;  and 
if  I  could  do  it  by  freeing  some  and  leaving  others  alone,  I 
would  also  do  that.'  But  Abraham  Lincoln  saved  the  Union, 
not  wheft  he  freed  the  slaves,  but  when  he  armed  them,  as  the 
seceding  white  soldiers  of  the  South  learnt  to  their  cost. 

We  would  urge  upon  the  American  Colonization  Society 
and  Liberian  Professor  Blyden"^  the  necessity  of  occupying 
themselves  only  with  colonizing  Liberia  with  African  ex- 
patriates. From  Liberia  missionaries  and  other  civilizers 
of  Liberian  nationality  can  pour  into  the  heart  of  Africa. 

These  are,  then,  our  reasons  for  saying  that  there  should 
not  be  two  or  more  independent  civilized  Ethiopian  States 
in  Africa  or  elsewhere,  and  in  that  all  true-hearted  Africans, 
we  are  sure,  will  agree  with  us. 

Liberia  and  Hayti  will  never  draw  the  sword  against  one 
another.  Hayti,  being  small,  cannot  contain  as  great  a 
number  of  people  as  Liberia,  but  may  some  day  need 
Liberia's  assistance ;  and  we  are  sanguine  that  the  friend- 
ship of  Liberia  and  Hayti  for  one  another  will  endure  till 
the  end  of  time. 

The  Republic  of  Liberia  is  the  country  we  suggest  should 
be  offered  as  a  home  to  all  the  Africo-Americans.  And 
Liberia,  the  Land  of  the  Free,  the  Light  of  Africa,  has  her 
arms  ever  open  and  ever  ready  to  welcome  all  Africans 
who  are  willing  to  become  citizens  of  her  Repubhc,  and 

■*^  If  Dr.  E.  W.  Blyden  and  the  American  Colonization  Society 
should  persist  in  their  endeavours  to  send  the  Americo-Africans 
to  anywhere  else  than  Liberia,  then  it  would  be  our  business  to 
oppose  them  most  energetically. 


256  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

to  submit  to  her  authority.  There  are  twenty  millions  or 
more  of  Africans— the  Haytians  do  not  come  under  con- 
sideration because  they  are  independent — who  are  expatri- 
ates, living  under  Caucasian  rule,  who,  should  they  wish  to 
be  independent,  ought  to  betake  themselves  to  Liberia  and 
there  find  a  home.  And  should  the  hundreds  of  millions 
of  African  natives  on  the  African  Continent  who  are  living 
under  Caucasian  rule  also  desire  independence,  they  also 
should  join  the  Liberians. 

Liberia  must  become  a  mighty  nation,  and  she  must 
astonish  the  world.  She  must  march  and  grow  as  fast  as 
the  United  States  of  North  America  have  done.  She  must 
crush  and  expel  all  oppressors  of  the  Africans  in  Africa. 
Were  the  Liberian  nation  a  mighty  one,  would  the  perpe- 
trators of  the  Yambuya  and  other  Stanley  horrors  in  Africa 
have  gone  unpunished,  and  continued  roaming  at  large? 
Justice,  '  even-handed  Justice,'  retributive  Nemesis,  would 
surely  have  overtaken  them. 

Was  it  not  the  duty  of  the  British  Government  to  have 
tried  Stanley  and  his  filibustering  companions  ?  They  did 
not,  and  their  conduct  in  this  matter  was  suspicious.  Very 
likely  the  British  Government  was  directly  interested  in 
Stanley's  expedition ;  at  any  rate,  Stanley  and  his  free- 
booters have  escaped  in  this  world  the  severe  punishment 
which  is  their  due. 

That  the  Liberian  Republic  is  the  only  suitable  Father- 
land for  the  Americo-Africans  and  for  all  other  Africans 
can  be  exemplified  and  attested.  The  Liberian  Constitution 
is  modelled  on  that  of  the  United  States,  which  is  a  Consti- 
tution copied  not  only  by  the  Liberians,  but  also  by  Mexico, 
Chili,  Argentina,  Peru,  Colombia,  Venezuela,  Ecuador, 
Bolivia,  Paraguay,  Uruguay,  Nicaragua,  Honduras,  San 
Salvador,  Guatemala,  and  Costa  Rica  also,  this  fact  testifying 
to  its  excellency  and  wholesomeness. 


I 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  257 

't  is  that  Constitution,  then,  that  the  Americo-Africans 
are  used  to  in  Liberia ;  but  in  Liberia  there  is  no  mob  rule, 
no  lynch  law ;  there  are  no  lynchings,  no  oppressions. 
Justice,  '  even-handed  Justice,'  prevails  and  is  paramount  in 
Liberia. 

No  Race  Problem  can  possibly  exist  in  Liberia,  because  no 
man  who  is  not  of  African  descent  can  be  a  Liberian  citizen. 

The  Liberian  rulers  are  not  whites,  as  in  the  United 
States  and  the  British  Colonies ;  they  are  blacks. 

The  official  language  is  not  French,  as  is  the  case  in  the 
Congo  Free  State,  bat  English,  the  language  which  the 
Africo- American  uses  daily  and  exclusively,  and  has  as  his 
adopted  mother-tongue. 

Unlike  the  Congo  Free  State,  Liberia  is  progressing. 
The  Chief  Magistrate  is  a  Liberian,  but  the  Chief  of  the 
Congo  Free  State  is  a  foreigner. 

These  are  the  advantages  she  possesses  over  the  Congo 
Free  State,  and  these  show  that  she  is  in  every  way  the 
suitable  and  indeed,  the  only,  country  for  the  Africans 
from  the  United  States  of  North  America. 

Liberia  rejoices  in  having  three  distinct  and  separate 
powers  of  Governmental  Administration,  viz.,  the  Executive, 
the  Legislative,  and  the  Judicial. 

The  Executive  power  is  vested  in  the  President,  Vice- 
President,  Secretary  of  State,  Secretary  of  Treasury, 
Attorney-General,  Postmaster-General,  etc.  ;  the  Legislative 
power  is  vested  in  the  House  of  Senators  and  the  House 
of  Representatives  ;  and  the  Judicial  authority  is  vested  in 
a  Supreme  Court  and  in  several  inferior  courts,  with  a  Chief 
Justice,  certain  other  judges,  and  divers  magistrates. 

Liberia  has  in  her  all  the  elements  of  progress,  and, 
embracing  as  it  does  at  least  150,000  square  miles  of 
territory,  Liberia  has  room  enough  to  accommodate  the 
entire  body  of  expatriated  Africans. 

17 


V 


258  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

The  Liberians  have  counties,  townships,  chartered  cities, 
mayors,  aldermen,  public  libraries  and  librarians,  churches 
and  clergymen,  coroners,  colleges  and  schools,  professors 
and  teachers,  lawyers  and  medical  men,  stores  and  mer- 
chants, warehouses,  wharves,  custom-houses,  lighthouses, 
forts,  a  body  of  regular  soldiers,  militia,  and  police. 

Among  the  important  towns  and  ports  of  Liberia  there  are 
Monrovia,  the  capital,  chief  port  and  seat  of  government 
Harper,  New  Georgia,  Caldwell,  Kentucky,  Millsburg,  Mar- 
shall, Edina  or  Buchanan,  Greenville,  Robertsport,  Grand 
Bassa,  Cresson,  Trade  Town,  Bexley,  Readsville,  Sesters 
River,  Lexington,  Cestos,  Sasstown  and  Louisiana. 

But  are  these  the  only  evidences  of  Liberian  civilization 
and  progress  ?  Far  from  it.  Liberia  produces  and  trades 
in  cocoa,  coffee,  cotton,  indigo,  ivory,  dye-woods  (including 
cam-woods),  gold,  tortoiseshell,  hides,  iron,  copper,  rubber, 
the  teeth  of  the  sea-horse,  palm-oil,  cattle,  goats,  swine, 
fowls,  ducks,  sheep,  the  sugar-cane,  rice,  Indian  corn,  Guinea 
corn,  millet,  gums,  wax,  ground-nuts,  ginger,  pepper,  arrow- 
root, palm  -  kernels,  yams,  bananas,  cassava,  pineapples, 
oranges,  limes,  cocoanuts,  tamarinds,  and  other  things. 

The  Liberian  Constitution,  we  might  have  mentioned 
before,  while  it  tolerates  all  religions  and  forms  of  worship, 
neither  has,  nor  would  allow,  any  Established  Church  ;  and 
this  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  also  disallows. 
The  Liberian  Constitution,  modelled,  as  it  is,  on  the  Ameri- 
can, is  better  than  the  British  Constitution  for  a  newly- 
formed  country. 

In  Liberia  there  is  no  such  thing  as  an  Ireland,  or  a 
Scotland,  or  a  Wales,  clamouring  for  Home  Rule,  as  is  the 
case  in  Britain. 

The  Chief  Magistrate  of  the  Liberians  is  not  bound  tO; 
belong  to  a  particular  branch  of  Christianity,  as  is  the  case  j 
with  the  British  Sovereign. 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  2  59 

There  is  no  such  thing  as  a  politico-established  religion 
in  Liberia,  as  is  the  case  with  Britain.  The  Protestant 
Dissenters  and  the  Catholics  long  to  see  the  Anglican 
State  Church  and  the  Scottish  Presbyterian  State  Church 
pulled  to  pieces  and  destroyed,  as  was  the  Irish  State 
Church  ;  and  they  are  repeatedly  assaulting  these  Churches, 
continually  pecking  at  their  crest.  The  Protestant  Dis- 
senters have  formed  the  English  Liberation  Society 
with  that  as  its  object.  The  Liberian  Constitution  does 
not  present  such  an  incongruity  or  such  an  injustice  as 
that,  whilst  a  Protestant,  or  Orthodox  Greek,  or  even  a 
Jew,  a  Mussulman,  an  Agnostic,  an  idolater,  or  an  unbe- 
liever, may  fill  any  post  in  Her  Britannic  Majesty's  service, 
the  British  Catholic  has  two  positions  from  which  he 
is  absolutely  debarred  ;  they  are  (i)  the  Viceroyalty  of 
Ireland  and  (2)  the  Lord  Chancellorship  of  England.  But 
every  post  in  the  service  of  the  Sovereign  People  of 
Liberia  is  open  to  all  Christians  ahke,  though  to  none  but 
Christians. 

Another  weak  point  in  the  British  Constitution  is  that 
every  Member  of  Parliament,  no  matter  of  what  religion  he 
professes  to  be,  no  matter  what  denomination  he  belongs 
to,  no  matter  whether  he  believes  in  any  religion  or  in  none, 
is  allowed  to  legislate,  if  he  can  command  a  majority  in 
some  constituency,  for  the  politico-established  Episcopal 
Church  of  England.  But  such  an  absurdity  does  not  exist 
in  Liberia,  the  Liberians  happily  having  no  established 
church,  and  wishing  for  none. 

It  may  not  be  amiss  to  add  here  that  the  days  when 
Protestant  Henry  VIII.  burnt,  or  beheaded,  or  other- 
wise persecuted.  Catholics ;  the  days  when  Catholic 
Mary  I.  burnt,  or  beheaded,  or  otherwise  persecuted, 
Protestants ;  the  days  when  the  Atheistic  Protestant 
Elizabeth   burnt,    or   beheaded,    or   otherwise   persecuted, 

17 — 2 


26o  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Catholics  and  Protestant  Nonconformists  or  Dissenters ; 
the  days  when  James  I.,  Charles  L,  and  Charles  II.  perse- 
cuted those  who  differed  from  them  in  religious  opinions, 
will  never  be  known  in  Liberia. 

The  Puritans  of  New  England,  because  they  were  perse- 
cuted in  the  Mother  Country,  fled  to  America,  but  when  the 
Quakers,  who  were  inferior  to  them  in  numbers,  for  the 
same  reason  followed  the  Puritans  into  the  New  England 
States  of  America,  the  Puritans  burnt  or  otherwise  perse- 
cuted the  members  of  the  Society  of  Friends.  The  Liberians 
are  never  likely  to  make  so  grave  a  mistake. 

Liberia,  as  we  said  before,  is  in  every  way  a  fitting  place 
for  the  Africo-American.  It  is  the  country  to  which 
the  American  Government  ought  to  send  its  Africans  ;  and 
the  Liberians  would  be  only  too  happy  to  receive  and 
welcome  them.  How  Liberia  is  progressing,  and  how 
vastly  superior  she  is  to  the  Congo  Free  State,  we  have 
fully  shown.  And  we  add  to  all  this  that  no  slavery  exists 
in  Liberia,  though  it  exists  in  a  very  virulent  form  in  the 
Congo  Free  State. 

This  is  the  way  in  which  we  look  at  our  Liberia  ;  but  do 
others  see  our  Liberia  with  the  same  eyes  }  Do  the  enemies, 
or  rather  (let  us  be  generous)  the  opponents,  of  the  Africans 
see  our  Liberia  in  the  same  light  and  with  the  same  eyes  as 
we  do  ?  Let  us  see  how  Laird  Clowes  looks  at  the 
Liberians. 

Writing  on  pages  i6o  and  i6i  of  his  'Black  America,' 
this  gentleman  gives  it  as  his  opinion  that  '  Not  only  in 
St.  Domingo  has  the  experiment  of  Negro  self-government 
been  tried  under  pseudo-civilized  conditions,  it  has  been 
tried  also  in  Liberia,  and  with  almost  equally  bad  results. 
To-day  in  Liberia  whites  are  treated  by  the  blacks  much  as 
blacks  are  treated  by  whites  in  the  South.  A  Negro 
State  has  never  yet  shown  itself  worthy  to  rank  on  terms  of 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  261 

equality  with  a  white  one,  and  there  are  no  symptoms  that 
it  will  ever  reach  that  level.  Diplomatic  intercourse  with 
such  States  cannot  be  carried  on  under  ordinary  conditions, 
neither  can  commercial  transactions.  Black  rule  means 
anarchy,  and  it  invariably  brings  to  the  front  the  fact  that 
the  Negro  hates  the  white  as  much  as  the  white  hates  him, 
and  is  even  more  ready  than  the  white  is  to  play  the  tyrant 
and  the  oppressor.  Life  for  a  white  in  every  existing  Negro 
state  is  well-nigh  unendurable.' 

Laird  Clowes's  arguments  are  founded  on  his  ignorance  of 
facts.  We  have  fairly  shown  that  he  has  been  contending 
against  the  African  in  his  '  Black  America '  with  the  weapons 
of  Ignorance  and  Prejudice.  To  take  his  statements  piece 
by  piece.  Laird  Clowes,  in  the  first  place,  says  that  *  Not 
only  in  St.  Domingo  has  the  experiment  of  African  self- 
government  been  tried  under  pseudo-civilized  conditions.' 
But  have  we  not  proved  that  the  Republic  of  Hayti  or  St. 
Domingo  is  flourishing?  It  would  be  needless  to  enter 
again  on  this  discussion.  At  the  same  time,  was  Toussaint- 
L'Ouverture  the  Great,  the  Father  of  his  Country  and  of 
the  Haytian  Constitution,  a  pseudo-civilized  President  and 
Commander-in-chief?  Not  the  Royal  Toussaint  the  Great, 
surely  !  Friends  and  enemies,  countrymen  and  foreigners, 
and  even  James  Anthony  Froude  and  Sir  Spencer  St.  John,* 
testify  to  the  greatness  of  Toussaint-L'Ouverture.  Laird 
Clowes  would  have  us  believe  that  the  Liberator  of  St. 
Domingo  was  a  pseudo-civilized  man.  A  great  Captain  and 
Governor  like  Toussaint  surely  knew  how  to  choose  his 
ministers;  and  DessaHnes  and  Christophe,  his  two  first 
lieutenants  and  advisers,  we  all  know  were  great  men. 
Laird  Clowes  makes  a  great  mistake  when  he  imagines  that 
his  intelligent  readers  are  gullible  believers  of  what  un- 
founded things  he  may  be  pleased  to  write.  The  statement 
'•'■  Also  see  chap,  vi.,  p.  227. 


262  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA 

that  '  the  experiment  of  Negro  self-government  has  been 
tried  under  pseudo-civilized  conditions '  is  false  from  the 
beginning  to  the  end. 

In  the  second  place,  he  says  :  '  It  {i.e.,  the  experiment  of 
African  self-government)  has  been  tried  also  in  Liberia,  and 
with  almost  equally  bad  results.  To-day  in  Liberia  whites 
are  treated  by  the  blacks  much  as  blacks  are  treated  by 
whites  in  the  South.'  Of  course,  Laird  Clowes  in  this 
makes  a  mere  unsupported  statement.  He  does  not  attempt 
to  support  his  statement  by  evidence,  because  there  is  none 
that  can  be  offered.  The  first  settlers  who  went  to  Liberia 
were  great  men.  When  the  American  Colonization  Society 
generously  called  upon  the  African  freedmen  in  the  United 
States  of  North  America  (in  1822)  to  return  to  the  land  of 
their  fathers,  the  liberated  Americo-Africans  did  not  shrink 
from  the  undertaking.  No ;  they  responded  loyally  and  cheer- 
fully to  the  generous  call  of  the  Africo- Americans.  They 
(the  first  settlers)  were  a  pious,  God-fearing  band  ;  they  were 
few  in  number,  a  mere  handful,  but  they  had  stout  hearts, 
and  every  one  of  them  was  a  host  in  himself.  Their  task  in 
the  land  of  their  fathers,  in  Liberia,  was  not  an  easy  one ;  it 
was  arduous  and  Herculean.  But  what  will  not  stout  hearts 
accomplish  ?  The  founders  of  the  Liberian  nation,  because 
they  were  brave,  did  not  shirk  their  duty,  but  worked  and 
fought  like  Trojans  ;  and  because  they  were  heroes  they 
conquered. 

Liberia  is  flourishing,  is  progressing.  The  American 
Colonization  Society  attest  that  Liberia  is  progressing, 
and  keeping  pace  with  nineteenth -century  civilization. 
That  society  is  not  composed  of  one  man,  but  of  scores 
of  intelligent  white  Americans.  And  can  a  mere  assertion 
of  Laird  Clowes  counterbalance  the  evidence  of  that 
society?  Liberia  has  only  had  (1891)  forty-four  years  of 
Independence,  yet  she  is   progressing.     But  what  was  the 


REPA  TRIA TION  AND  LIBERIA.  263 

condition  of  England,  Ireland,  Scotland,  Wales,  France, 
Germany,  Austro-Hungary,  Russia,  Spain,  Norway  and 
Sweden,  Denmark,  Holland,  Portugal,  Switzerland,  when 
each  of  these  countries  had  forty-four  years  of  Inde- 
pendence or  self-government?  What  that  condition  was 
the  student  of  European  History  knows  only  too  well. 

But  are  the  American  Colonization  Society  the  only 
persons  who  thus  bear  testimony  to  the  progress  of 
Liberia,  and  eulogize  the  Liberians?  Brookes's  'General 
Gazetteer '  also  testifies  to  the  capabilities  of  the  Liberians 
for  self-government,  and  to  the  condition  of  Liberia 
generally.     It  says  : 

'  The  greater  part  of  the  early  settlers  from  America 
were  men  of  decided  piety,  and  their  just,  humane,  and 
benevolent  policy  has  given  them  an  astonishing  influence 
over  the  native  tribes.  In  1827  this  sable  community  had 
risen  completely  above  the  pressure  of  urgent  necessities. 
Monrovia  was  rapidly  increasing  in  accommodation  and 
increasing  in  magnitude,  and  several  fresh  towns  were 
already  springing  up.  The  soil  is  extremely  fertile ;  the 
natives  of  the  country,  without  tools,  without  skill,  and 
with  little  labour,  raising  more  grain  and  vegetables  than  j/ 
they  can  consume,  and  often  more  than  they  can  sell. 
Cattle,  swine,  fowls,  ducks,  goats,  and  sheep  thrive  without 
feeding,  and  require  no  other  care  than  to  keep  them  from 
straying.  Cotton,  coffee,  indigo,  and  sugar-cane  are  all  the 
spontaneous  growth  of  the  forests,  and  may  be  cultivated 
at  pleasure  to  any  extent  by  such  as  are  disposed.  The 
same  may  be  said  of  rice,  Indian  corn,  Guinea  corn,  millet, 
and  too  many  species  of  fruits  and  vegetables  to  be 
enumerated.  Add  to  all  this  that  winter  is  here  unknown ; 
the  hills  and  plains  are  covered  with  perpetual  verdure, 
and  Nature  is  constantly  pouring  her  treasures,  all  the  year 
round,  into  the  laps  of  the  industrious.     The  trade  and 


264  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

commerce  extend  to  the  coast,  to  the  interior  parts  of  the 
continent,  and  to  foreign  vessels,  and  are  already  valuable, 
and  fast  increasing.  The  chief  exports  are  rice,  palm-oil, 
ivory,  tortoiseshell,  dye-woods,  gold,  hides,  wax,  and  a 
small  (?)  amount  of  coffee.  The  imports  consist  of  the  pro- 
ducts and  manufactures  of  the  four  quarters  of  the  world. 
The  harbour  is  seldom  clear  of  European  and  American 
shipping,  and  the  bustle  and  thronging  of  the  streets  show 
something  already  of  the  activity  of  the  smaller  seaports  of 
the  United  States.  Mechanics  of  nearly  every  trade  are 
carrying  on  their  various  occupations,  and  not  a  child 
or  youth  in  the  colony  but  is  provided  with  an  appro- 
priate school.  The  piety  of  the  first  settlers  has  continued 
to  spread,  and  the  standard  of  morals  consequently  remains 
high.  The  Sabbath  is  carefully  regarded,  and  Sunday- 
schools  have  been  established  for  the  benefit  of  the  native 
children.  The  cheerful  abodes  of  civilization  and  happi- 
ness ;  the  flourishing  settlements ;  the  sound  of  Christian 
instruction,  and  scenes  of  Christian  worship,  which  are 
heard  and  seen  in  this  land  of  brooding  pagan  darkness ; 
a  thousand  contented  freemen  united  in  founding  a  Christian 
Empire,  happy  themselves,  and  the  instrument  of  happiness 
to  others,  while  they  refresh  the  hearts,  cannot  fail  to  en- 
courage the  brightest  anticipations  of  Christian  philan- 
thropists.' 

The  Rev.  W.  Moister,  a  British  clergyman  of  the  Wes- 
leyan  persuasion,  who  has  had  a  long  residence  among 
the  African  people  of  the  west  and  south,  and  is,  therefore, 
a  competent  and  duly-qualified  person  to  speak  with  some 
authority  ot  Liberia  and  its  people,  also  eulogizes  the 
Liberians  in  this  wise  : 

'  The  majority  of  the  early  settlers  were  men  of  steady, 
industrious  habits  and  decided  piety  belonging  to  different 
Christian  denominations,  and  they  set  about  the  cultivation 


REPA TRIA TION  AND  LIBERIA.  265 

of  the  ground,  and  the  preparation  of  homes  for  themselves 
and  their  families  in  their  adopted  country,  in  a  manner 
which  augured  well  for  the  success  of  the  enterprise.  Their 
just,  humane,  and  benevolent  policy  was,  moreover,  said  to 
have  given  them  astonishing  influence  over  the  native  tribes, 
and  the  settlement  was  commenced  under  favourable  and 
promising  circumstances. 

*  Although  thus  commenced  by  emigrants  from  America, 
Liberia  was  not  an  American  Colony,  properly  speaking, 
but  a  small  Republic  or  Commonwealth,  after  the  model 
of  the  United  States,  and  entirely  independent  of  the 
parent  country  politically,  although  receiving  important 
moral  and  material  aid  from  it  in  different  ways  when 
necessary. 

'  Accordingly,  a  Constitution  and  Laws  were  framed  for 
the  Government  of  the  settlement,  provision  being  made 
for  the  selection  of  a  President,  Members  of  the  House  of 
Representatives,  and  other  public  functionaries.  Of  course, 
the  difficulties  connected  with  the  founding  of  this  infant 
nation  were  neither  few  nor  small,  and  some  errors  may 
have  been  made  at  an  early  period  of  the  undertaking; 
but,  notwithstanding  every  drawback,  in  all  fairness  it  must 
be  said  that  the  enterprise  succeeded  better  than  could 
have  been  expected,  all  things  being  considered.  As  the 
number  of  settlers  increased,  townships  were  laid  out,  farms 
cultivated,  towns  and  villages  planned,  and  buildings  erected 
in  some  of  them  which  were  very  creditable  to  a  rising 
community. 

*  The  soil  of  Liberia  is  reported  to  be  extremely  fertile, 
and  well  adapted  to  the  growth  of  all  kinds  of  tropical 
produce.  Cotton,  coffee,  indigo,  and  the  sugar-cane  thrive 
well,  and  rice,  Indian  corn,  Guinea  corn,  millet,  and  various 
kinds  of  fruits  and  vegetables,  are  cultivated  with  ease  and 
success.     Cattle,  sheep,  goats,  swine,  fowls,  and  ducks  are 


266  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

said  to  thrive  with  little  feeding,  and  to  require  no  other 
care  than  to  keep  them  from  straying. 

'  Much  zeal  and  perseverance  have  been  displayed  in  all 
these  Christian  agencies,  and  the  result  is  seen  in  the 
parsonages,  places  of  worship,  colleges,  and  school  buildings 
which  have  been  erected  in  most  of  the  towns  and  villages 
in  the  settlement,,  and  in  the  improved  morals  of  the  people, 
which  will  compare  favourably  with  those  of  many  other 
Christian  countries,  and  which  augur  well  for  the  future 
prosperity  of  Liberia.'* 

Yet  Laird  Clowes  would  have  his  readers  believe  that 
'the  experiment  of  Negro  self-government  has  been  tried 
in  Liberia  with  ahiiost  equally  bad  results'  But  the  autho- 
rities just  quoted  evidently  do  not  share  Laird  Clowes's 
opinions  and  sentiments.  Nobler  feelings  and  better 
passions  towards  their  fellow-men  actuate  them ;  the  truth 
of  what  they  personally  know  guides  them  in  their  utter- 
ances. Like  the  good  Mussulman,  Abou  ben  Adhem,  and 
the  good  Christian,  the  unfortunate  American  John  Brown, 
they  love  their  fellow-men. 

But  what  can  Laird  Clowes  mean  when  he  says  :  '  To-day 
in  Liberia  whites  are  treated  by  the  blacks  much  as  blacks 
are  treated  by  whites  in  the  South '  ?  Can  he  mean  that 
whites  in  Liberia  are  lynched  by  Liberians  ?  Can  he  mean 
that  whites  are  refased  a  hearing,  a  fair  hearing,  in  the 
Liberian  Courts  of  Justice  ?  Can  he  mean  that  the  persons 
and  property  of  whites  are  not  protected  by  Liberian  law  ? 
He  cannot  surely  mean  either  of  these  things.  Supposing 
it  were  even  as  Laird  Clowes  gives  out,  that  the  whites  are 
maltreated  in  Liberia,  have  the  European  and  American 
Ministers  and  Consuls-General  in  Liberia  made  any  protest 
against  the  maltreatment  of  the  whites  by  the  Liberians  ? 

*  'Africa  :  Past  and  Present,'  by  an  Old  Resident,  pp.  222, 
223,  225. 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  267 

If  Clowes  were  true  in  his  accusation,  would  these  officials 
not  have  lodged  some  protest  with  the  Liberian  Govern- 
ment ?  They  have  not  done  so ;  and  we  must  therefore 
take  it  for  granted  that  the  whites  are  not  maltreated  by 
the  Liberian  citizens,  or  unprotected  by  the  Liberian 
Government.  Affairs  are  not  in  that  strained  relation,  and 
we  must  again  ask.  What  does  Laird  Clowes  mean  by 
saying  that  *  to-day,  in  Liberia,  whites  are  treated  by  the 
blacks  much  as  blacks  are  treated  by  whites  in  the  South '  ? 
To  that  statement  we  attach  one,  and  only  one  meaning. 
In  plain  words,  Mr.  Clowes  would  have  his  readers  under- 
stand that  the  Liberian  Constitutional  Government  abso- 
lutely refuses  to  confer  citizenship  on  the  white  man  in 
Liberia.  That  is  how  we  take  his  words.  We  must  admit 
— but  it  is  familiar  knowledge — that  the  Liberian  Constitu- 
tion confers  citizenship  on  none  save  those  of  African 
descent ;  and  for  this  policy  the  Liberians  are  certainly  to 
be  commended  and  congratulated.  If  citizenship  were 
conferred  on  the  white  man,  why,  Liberia  would  simply 
be  swamped  by  the  white  men,  and  this  would  endanger 
the  safety  and  independence  of  the  Liberian  Republic. 
The  Liberians  protect  the  property  and  persons  of  the 
whites,  and  give  them  a  fair  and  impartial  hearing  in  their 
Courts  of  Justice.  In  Liberia  white  men  are  not  lynched  ; 
but  the  Africans  in  the  United  States  of  North  America, 
and  particularly  in  the  Sunny  South,  suffer  all  these  mal- 
treatments and  are  unprotected  by  the  American  law.  The 
condition  of  the  white  in  Liberia  is  far  better  than  the  con- 
dition of  the  black  is  in  the  United  States.  The  African 
in  the  United  States  is  regarded  by  the  white  man  as  an 
alien,  and  has  no  civic  rights ;  and  must  the  African  in 
Liberia  good-naturedly  confer  citizenship  on  the  Caucasian  ? 
The  British  inhabitants  of  Cape  Colony  and  Natal  have  a 
Constitution,  but  in  neither  of  these  do  the  African  in- 


268  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

habitants  possess  civic  rights.  And  must  Liberia  be  the 
white  man's  milch  cow  and  have  citizenship  conferred  on 
him  ?  The  aboriginal  inhabitants  of  Australia,  though  the 
natural  owners  of  the  soil,  have  no  political  rights,  while 
the  descendants  of  the  convict-settlers  lord  it  over  them. 
Yet  must  Liberia,  forsooth,  bestow  on  the  white  man  the 
rights  of  a  Liberian  citizen  ?  The  Liberians  will  be  fooHsh 
indeed  if  they  ever  confer  citizenship  on  the  white  man. 
Should  they  ever  do  so,  they  would  be  simply  sharpening  a 
sword  for  their  own  heads,  and  planting  the  seed  of  a  Race 
Problem  which  would  threaten  the  very  existence  of  the 
Liberian  Republic.  But  they  have  too  much  good  sense  to 
make  such  a  fatal  mistake. 

In  the  third  place,  Laird  Clowes  gravely  tells  us  that 
'  A  Negro  State  has  never  yet  shown  itself  worthy  to  rank 
on  terms  of  equality  with  a  white  one,  and  there  are  no 
symptoms  that  it  will  ever  reach  that  level.'  Is  Mr.  Clowes 
aware,  or  is  he  forgetful  of  the  fact,  that  such  Hamitic  or 
African  States  as  Canaan,  Phoenicia,  Carthage,  Assyria, 
Babylon,  Ethiopia,  Abyssinia,  Morocco,  Ashantee,  Daho- 
mey, Sokoto,  Gandu,  Bornu,  Zululand  and  others,  have 
flourished!  Was  not  Canaan  the  equal  of  its  white  con- 
temporaries? The  Phoenician  Empire  was  at  least  equal 
to  its  white  contemporaries,  when  her  ships,  her  navy, 
scoured  every  sea. 

Did  not  Carthage,  when  in  the  height  of  her  power,  give 
laws  to  Spain  and  Portugal,  and  hold  Sardinia,  Sicily,  Cor- 
sica, and  the  Balearic  Islands  in  subjection  ?  Were  not  the 
Carthaginians  the  equals  of  the  Romans,  and  were  they  not 
the  mightiest  antagonists  the  Romans  ever  encountered? 
Was  not  the  Assyrian  or  Babylonian  Empire  of  the 
Nabuchadonosors  one  of  the  greatest  that  ever  existed  in  the 
world?  Yet  Laird  Clowes  tells  us  that  an  African  State 
has   never  yet   shown   itself  worthy  to  rank  on  terms  of 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  269 

equality  with  a  white  one  !  Ethiopia  (modern  Nubia)  and 
Abyssinia  have  been  mighty  Empires,  and  have  not  these 
in  their  prime,  and  in  the  summit  of  their  glory,  been  each 
the  equal  of  their  white  contemporaries  ? 

Did  not  Morocco,  when  in  the  zenith  of  her  power,  dictate 
laws  to  the  Spaniards  and  Portuguese  ?  This  State,  when  in 
its  prime,  equalled  the  best  European  States  then  in  existence. 
Morocco,  like  Abyssinia,  even  now  takes  rank  with  many 
white  States.  Have  not  Ashantee,  Dahomey,  Madagascar, 
Sokoto,  Gandu,  Bornu,  Zululand,  and  other  African  States, 
as  we  had  occasion  to  point  out,  made  their  mark  in  this 
world's  history  ?  Liberia  and  Hayti,  though  they  do  not 
rank  with  Britain,  France,  Germany,  Russia,  Austro- 
Hungary,  Italy,  United  States  of  North  America,  and  Spain, 
and  other  Caucasian  Countries,  on  terms  of  equality,  are 
certainly  on  a  level  with  Roumania,  Greece,  Bulgaria, 
Switzerland,  Servia,  Peru,  Colombia,  Venezuela,  Ecuador, 
Bolivia,  and  Uruguay ;  while  Paraguay,  Montenegro,  Hon- 
duras, San  Salvador,  Guatemala,  Nicaragua,  Costa  Rica, 
Transvaal,  Congo  Free  State  of  Belgian  Leopold,  Zulu 
Republic,  Monaco,  Andorra,  San  Marino,  Liechtenstein, 
and  Luxemburg  are  each  immeasurably  inferior  to  the 
respective  allied  kindred  States  of  Liberia  and  Hayti. 

In  the  fourth  place,  Mr.  Clowes  goes  on  to  say  that 
*  Diplomatic  intercourse  with  such  (African)  States  cannot 
be  carried  on  under  ordinary  conditions  ;  neither  can  com- 
mercial transactions.'  This  is,  again,  an  argumentum  ad 
ignorantiam. 

Is  Mr.  Clowes  aware  that  the  principal  countries  of 
Europe  and  the  Americas  receive  Ministers  and  Consuls- 
General  and  Consuls  from  Liberia  and  Hayti,  while  these 
latter  receive  in  their  turn  diplomatic  and  commercial  repre- 
sentatives from  the  Americas  and  Europe  ?  It  is  common 
knowledge  that  whilst  Britain  is  represented  in  Hayti  in  th  e 


270  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

person  of  Mr.  James  N.  E.  Zohrab,  the  Consul-General  and 
Minister,  Monsieur  P.  E.  Latortue  represents  Hayti  in  like 
manner  in  Britain;  Hannibal  Price,  Esq.,  does  the  same 
duty  for  her  in  the  United  States  of  North  America,  and 
Mr.  Frederic  Douglass  is  the  Yankee  Minister  to  Hayti. 
It  is  also  common  knowledge  that  whilst  Liberia  is  repre- 
sented by  her  Minister  in  the  United  States,  the  Yankees 
are  represented  in  Liberia  by  the  Rev.  Mr.  Ezekiel  Ezra 
Smith,  Consul-General  and  Minister-Resident.  And  while 
Sir  James  Shaw  Hay  represents  British  interests  in  Liberia, 
Mr.  Henry  Hayman  discharges  similar  functions  in  Britain. 
That  being  so,  is  there  anyone  who  will  deny  that  the  state- 
ment that  '  Diplomatic  intercourse  with  such  (Negro)  States 
cannot  be  carried  on  under  ordinary  conditions  ;  neither 
can  commercia  transactions,'  as  made  by  Laird  Clowes,  is 
as  foohsh  as  it  is  untrue,  and  evidently  based  on  ignorance 
and  prejudice  ? 

In  the  fifth  place,  Laird  Clowes  asserts  that  '  Black 
rule  means  anarchy,  and  it  invariably  brings  to  the  front 
the  fact  that  the  Negro  hates  the  white  as  much  as  the 
white  hates  him,  and  is  even  more  ready  than  the  white  is 
to  play  the  tyrant  and  the  oppressor.  Life  for  a  white  in 
every  existing  Negro  State  is  well-nigh  unendurable.'  Does 
anarchy,  then,  reign  in  Liberia  ?  Does  anarchy  reign,  then, 
in  Hayti  ?  But  has  Europe  never  experienced  anarchy  ? 
Have  the  Americas  never  experienced  anarchy  ?  Mr 
Clowes  says  that  '  The  Negro  hates  the  white  as  much  as 
the  white  hates  him,  and  is  even  more  ready  than  the  white 
is  to  play  the  tyrant  and  the  oppressor.'  The  opinion  of 
an  African  is  surely  equal  to  that  of  a  Caucasian ;  and, 
believing  our  say  to  be  as  good  as  /«>,  we  give  an  emphatic 
and  entire  denial  to  the  allegations  of  Laird  Clowes.  Al- 
though he  may  hate  the  African,  the  African  does  not  hate 
even  the  Commissioner  of  the  Times.     Though  the  Yankee 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  271 

plays  the  tyrant  and  the  oppressor  to  the  Africans  in  the 
United  States,  the  Liberians  and  Haytians  do  not  retaliate. 
How  could  our  Liberians  and  Haytians  retaliate  ?  If  the 
Liberians  and  Haytians  did  play  the  tyrant  and  oppressor, 
would  the  Europeans  and  American  Powers  take  no  action 
in  the  matter? 

There  are  Britishers  and  other  Caucasians  in  Liberia  and 
Hayti,  as  all  the  world  knows.  Are  they  tyrannized  over 
and  oppressed,  and  do  they  remain  passive  ?  Surely  Britain, 
the  Power  who  is  bullying  small  States  like  Portugal  in 
South  Africa,  and  Venezuela  in  South  America  on  the 
Guianese  Boundary  Question,  would  not  hesitate  to  bully,  if 
not  to  bombard,  the  Liberians  and  Haytians  if  the  Britishers 
in  Liberia  and  Hayti  were  maltreated  !  But,  as  Britain 
takes  no  steps  against  the  Liberians  and  Haytians,  our 
knowledge  of  the  world  assures  us  that  the  ill-treatment  of 
Caucasians  in  Liberia  and  Hayti  is  a  dream  of  Laird 
Clowes.  A  more  affable  and  hospitable  people  than  the 
Liberian  and  the  Haytian  does  not  exist  on  this  our  earth. 
'  Life  for  a  white  in  every  existing  Negro  State  is  well-nigh 
unendurable '  indeed  !  But.  would  the  British  Indiarubber 
States  Company  (Limited)  have  been  formed  '  for  the  pur- 
pose of  acquiring  and  working  a  concession  from  the 
Government  of  the  Republic  of  Liberia,  for  the  sole  right 
of  collecting  and  exporting  indiarubber  and  guttapercha 
from  the  said  Republic  for  the  European  and  American 
markets,'  if 'life  for  a  white  in  every  existing  Negro  State 
was  well-nigh  unendurable,'  and  '  black  rule  meant  anarchy '? 
There  are  many  Europeans  and  Americans  both  in  Liberia 
and  in  Hayti  who  are  happy  and  contented. 

Laird  Clowes  wanted  to  show,  but  he  did  not  show,  that 
'  a  fringe  of  Negro  States  on  the  southern  and  south- 
eastern borders  of  the  (American)  Union  would  be  a  per- 
petual danger  to  the  whole  Federation ;'  but  he  failed,  we 


272  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

say.  Instead  of  making  that  his  business,  he  directed  an 
angry  tirade  and  rigmarole  against  the  Liberians  and 
Haytians  and  Africans'  in  general,  and  said  that  '  Not  only 
in  St.  Domingo  has  the  experiment  of  Negro  self-Govern- 
ment  been  tried  under  pseudo-civilized  conditions.  It  has 
been  tried  also  in  Liberia,  and  with  almost  equally  bad 
results,'  etc.  But  we  have  taken  pains  to  refute  every  one 
of  his  calumnies.  There  must  not  be  '  a  fringe  of  Negro 
States  on  the  southern  and  south-eastern  borders  of  the 
(American)  Union '  is  Laird  Clowes's  suggestion.  And  in 
that  he  has  our  support.  The  Africo- Americans  ought  on 
no  account  to  remain  ;  and  in  order  to  effectively  solve 
the  Race  Problem,  we  counsel  Repatriation  to  Africa  and 
Independence  in  Liberia.  Liberia  is  in  every  way  a  fitting 
Fatherland  for  the  African  in  the  United  States.  The 
founders  of  the  Liberian  Republic  originally  came  from 
America,  and  returned  to  the  land  of  their  ancestors.  Why 
should  not  the  Africans  in  the  United  States  of  North 
America  follow  their  example  ?  Were  the  first  President  of 
the  Liberians,  Joseph  Jenkins  Roberts,  to  rise  from  his 
grave,  he  would  express  surprise  at  the  progress  the  Liberians 
have  made  and  are  making. 

Laird  Clowes,  after  libelling  the  Liberians  on  pages  i6o 
and  i6i  of  his  '  Black  America,'  thus  writes  on  page  183  in 
the  same  book :  '  Jefferson,  who  died  nearly  forty  years 
before  Emancipation  became  an  accomplished  fact,  did  not 
omit  to  prepare,  so  far  as  lay  in  his  power,  for  the  evil  he 
saw  approaching.  With  Henry  Clay  and  others  he  founded 
the  African  Colonization  Society,  which  established  on  the 
West  Coast  of  Africa  the  Negro  Republic  of  Liberia,  and 
between  1820  and  i860  sent  thither  about  10,000  free 
coloured  people.  It  may  at  once  be  admitted  that  the 
Colony  has  not  been  a  conspicuous  success,  for  the 
American  immigrants  and  their  descendants   now  hardly 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  27  3 

number  5,000  souls,  and  according  to  Mr.  Charles  H.  J. 
Taylor,  a  late  American  Minister  to  the  Republic,  the  place 
is  to-day  "a  land  of  snakes,  centipedes,  fever,  miasma, 
poverty,  superstition,  and  death.'" 

The  Colonization  Society,  which  with  philanthropic  gene- 
rosity sent  the  captive  Africans  from  the  land  of  the  Yankees 
to  build  up  the  Liberian  Nation  in  Africa,  was,  and  is, 
not  called  the  African^  but  the  A??iericap,  Society,  inasmuch 
as  the  society  originated  in  America.  It  is  a  slight  error 
Laird  Clowes  makes,  we  admit,  but  it  is  still  a  mistake.  A 
more  fitting  name  for  that  organization  would,  however,  be 
the  Liberian  Repatriaticn  and  Colonizaimi  Society.  We 
would  humbly  recommend  it  to  the  American  Colonization 
Society  for  adoption. 

He  gives  us  to  understand  that  Jefferson,  *  with  Henry 
Clay  and  others,  founded  the  African  (American)  Coloniza- 
tion Society.'  The  real  founder  of  the  American  Coloniza- 
tion Society  was  Henry  Clay  himself.  He  was  the  founder, 
and  not  Jefferson.  Clay  did  not  merely  support  Jefferson, 
but  was  the  organizer  of  the  American  Colonization  Society. 
Henry  Clay  was  not,  however,  a  philanthropist  and  aboli- 
tionist of  the  William  Wilberforce  type.  His  philanthropy 
and  abolition  were  not  of  the  right  sort.  While  he  was  for 
abolishing  slavery  in  all  the  States  of  the  American  Union 
lying  to  the  north  of  latitude  -^d"  30',  he  advocated  the  cause 
of  slavery  in  Missouri  and  the  Slave  States.  He  was  for 
perpetuating  slavery  in  California,  if  that  State  so  desired, 
while  he  was  for  abolishing  slavery  in  Columbia,  and  for 
leaving  the  States  of  New  Mexico  to  their  discretion. 

Despite  the  eccentricity  of  Henry  Clay,  no  one  will  deny 
that  he  has  rendered  the  Africans  a  service  by  helping  to 
send  them  to  Liberia.  Would  that  every  white  American 
would  contribute  to  send  the  American  African  to  the  land 
of  his  forefathers — to  Liberia  !     It  is  the  debt  every  white 

18 


274  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

American  owes  the  African  in  the  United  States,  and  one 
which  he  must  some  day  discharge.  The  American 
Colonization  Society,  it  is  true,  yearly  sends  expatriates  to 
repatriation,  Independence,  and  Liberia ;  but  we  think  the 
American  Government  could  easily  spare  a  few  millions  of 
dollars  for  the  American  Africans,  with  which  they  might  be 
sent  in  a  body  to  Africa,  to  Liberia. 

Laird  Clowes  tells  us  that  '  it  may  at  once  be  admitted 
that  the  Colony  (of  Liberia)  has  not  been  a  conspicuous 
success,  for  the  American  immigrants  and  their  descendants 
now  hardly  number  5,000  souls.'  Well^  we  do  not '  at  once 
admit '  that  Liberia  has  not  been  a  conspicuous  success^  but  we 
firmly  declare  that  Liberia  has  been  a  conspicuous  success. 
The  Africaft  Repository  for  April,  1891,  the  organ  of  the 
American  Colonization  Society,  says  with  authority : 
'  Emigration  to  Liberia  every  year  under  the  auspices  of 
the  American  Colonization  Society  has  been  uninterrupted 
for  the  past  seventy  years.  Those  now  reported  make  the 
number  sent  since  the  civil  war  to  be  4,201,  and  a  total 
from  the  beginning  of  16,209,  exclusive  of  4,722  recaptured 
Africans,  which  it  induced  and  enabled  the  Government  of 
the  United  States  to  settle  in  Liberia,  making  a  grand  total 
of  21,921  persons  to  whom  the  Society  has  given  homes  in 
Africa,'  thereby  showing  that  Liberia  is  being  gradually 
reinforced. 

Mr.  Clowes,  again,  says  :  '  According  to  Mr.  Charles  H.  J. 
Taylor,  a  late  American  Minister  to  the  Republic  of  Liberia, 
the  place  is  to-day  "  a  land  of  snakes,  centipedes,  fever, 
miasma,  poverty,  superstition,  and  death." '  That  was  what 
Mr.  Charles  H.  J.  Taylor,  said ;  but  there  are  others  who 
have  spread  even  worse  reports  than  that  of  Liberia. 

The  Hon.  and  Rev.  Ezekiel  Ezra  Smith,  who  is  not  the 

late  nor  a  late  American  Minister,  but  is  the  present  (1891) 

,  Minister-Resident  and  Consul-General  of  the  United  States 


REPA TRIA TION  AND  LIBERIA.  275 

to  Liberia,  writing  from  Monrovia,  April  i,  1891,  thus  bears 
witness  to  the  condition  or  state  of  Liberia  :  '  Since  I  wrote 
.  .  .  last  I  have  seen  much  of  Liberia.  I  have  visited  Cape 
Palmas,  met  with  the  different  churches,  and  seen  something 
of  the  operation  of  the  institutions  there.  I  had  the  pleasure 
to  meet  Bishops  Ferguson  and  Taylor,  and  the  leading  men 
generally.  I  was  much  delighted  while  conversing  with 
Bishop  Ferguson  to  ascertain  the  high  hopes  he  entertained 
for  Liberia's  future  prosperity.  The  Bishop  is  doing  effec- 
tive work.  The  emigrants  last  settled  at  Cape  Palmas  are 
doing  well.  The  bullock  and  cart  are  considerably  employed 
at  this  point. 

^From  Cape  Palmas  I  went  to  Sinoe,  the  home  of  Hon. 
Z.  B.  Roberts,  Associate  Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court, 
Hon.  James  J.  Ross,  ex- Attorney-General,  ex- Senator  Fuller, 
and  other  gentlemen  of  influence,  who,  notwithstanding  their 
positions  as  officials  of  the  Government,  have  farms.  The 
emigrants  located  at  Sinoe  in  1888  are  moving  on  more  and 
more  successfully. 

*  I  next  had  the  pleasure  to  spend  a  few  days  at  Grand 
Bassa,  which  comprises  Lower  and  Upper  Buchanan  and 
Edina.  Grand  Bassa  surpasses  either  of  the  towns  or  settle- 
ments above  mentioned  in  point  of  commercial  transactions. 
While  there  I  met  some  of  the  emigrants  who  came  in 
May,  1889.  They  appear  to  be  doing  well,  and  seem 
contented. 

'On  the  15th  ultimo,  in  company  with  Hon.  C.  T.  O. 
King,  Hon.  H.  A.  Williams  (Mayor  of  Monrovia),  Colonel 
A.  D.  Williams,  Judge  Dennis,  and  a  number  of  other 
gentlemen,  I  embarked  for  Grand  Cape  Mount  on  a  small 
sailing  craft.  We  encountered  a  most  tempestuous  voyage, 
arriving  at  Cape  Mount  on  the  morning  of  the  17th,  being 
quite  wet  and  much  fatigued.  Hon.  C.  T.  O.  King,  myself, 
and  others  of  the  party  called  out  to  the  settlement  where 

18-  2 


2/6  777/^  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  emigrants  were  located.  After  visiting  each  individual 
house  and  looking  at  their  beautiful  promising  farms, 
a  meeting  of  all  the  new-comers  was  held  at  the  school- 
house.  Oh  yes  ;  they  have  built  themselves  a  school-house 
in  the  centre  of  the  settlement.  At  the  meeting  short 
speeches  were  made  by  Mr.  King  and  myself.  Afterwards 
remarks  by  different  persons  of  the  emigrants  were  made. 
Each  one  expressed  himself  contented.  Their  farms,  con- 
sisting of  coffee,  cassava,  potatoes,  yams,  eddoes,  cocoa, 
plantains,  bananas,  ginger,  rice,  etc.,  are  as  pretty  as  any 
I  have  seen  in  the  country.  They  have  evidently,  con- 
sidering the  surroundings,  done  remarkably  well.  I  also 
visited  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Mission  at  Cape  Mount, 
and  observed  somewhat  of  its  workings.  I  think  it  is  doing 
a  great,  yea,  a  good  work.  Cape  Mount  is,  indeed,  a  fine 
portion  of  this  country.' 

This  is  what  the  Hon.  and  Rev.  Ezekiel  Ezra  Smith 
says.  He  is  the  present  United  States  Minister-Resident  and 
Consul-General  to  Liberia.  He  is  on  the  spot,  and  writes  on 
the  spot.  He  does  not  say  that  Liberia  is  '  a  land  of  snakes, 
centipedes,  fever,  miasma,  poverty,  superstition,  and  death,' 
as  Mr.  Charles  H.  J.  Taylor  does,  but,  on  the  contrary,  he 
eulogizes  it.  We  certainly  prefer  the  statement  of  the  pre- 
sent United  States  Minister  in  Liberia  to  that  of  the  Minister 
of  long  ago.  Yet  we  are  sure  that  at  no  time  was  Liberia 
'a  land  of  snakes,  centipedes,  fever,  miasma,  poverty, 
superstition,  and  death '  in  the  sense  he  means,  not  even 
at  the  time  when  he  (Mr.  Charles  H.  J.  Taylor)  was 
American  Minister  to  Liberia.  Liberia  was  never  so  un- 
ortunate  as  to  be  subjected  to  miasma.  The  sanitary 
regulations  were  always  rigid,  and  as  rigidly  enforced.  If 
there  be  snakes  in  Liberia,  there  are  snakes  all  over  the 
Americas,  Australasia,  and  the  West  Indies.  There  are 
snakes  in  Asia,  particularly  in  the  East  Indies,  the  home 


REPA  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  277 

of  the  cobra  di  capello.  If  there  be  centipedes  in  Liberia, 
there  are  centipedes  all  the  world  over.  If  there  be  fever 
in  Liberia,  there  is  fever  all  the  world  over,  and  always  will 
be.  Liberia  has  never  experienced  such  a  fell  disease  as 
the  '  Black  Death,'  which  ravaged  not  only  Asia,  but  the 
whole  of  Europe,  laying  low  at  least  one -third  of  the 
population  in  every  state  it  visited  in  the  time  of  the  Third 
Edward,  the  Prince  who  humbled  the  pride  of  France  at 
Cre^y. 

Liberia  has  never  experienced  such  a  calamity  as  the 
Great  Plague  which  made  its  appearance  in  Britain  in  the 
reign  of  the  Merry  Monarch,  carrying  away  between  300,000 
and  500,000  Britishers  to  the  mansion-house  of  Hades. 
But  a  few  years  ago  cholera,  a  fell  disease,  struck  down 
Frenchmen,  Spaniards,  and  Italians,  and  they  perished 
by  the  hundred.  Thousands  of  Trinidadians  perished 
by  the  cholera  of  1854;  but  Liberia  has  never  ex- 
perienced cholera — never  has  had  a  miasma  of  any  sort. 
If  there  be  poverty  in  Liberia,  there  is  poverty  all  the 
world  over,  and  always  will  be.  London,  the  largest,  most 
populous,  and  richest  City  and  Metropolis  in  the  world, 
contains  the  greatest  number  of  poor  persons  that  ever 
congregated  in  any  one  country  in  proportion  to  its  popu- 
lation. Liberia  cannot  be  poor,  for  Liberia  is  one  of  the 
chosen  spots — perhaps  the  best  and  richest  spot — in  Africa. 
And  was  not  Africa  always  rich  ?  Is  it  not  rich  now  ?  Are 
not  the  Europeans  vying  with  one  another  as  to  whom  the 
greatest  part  of  Africa  should  fall  ?  Why?  Because  Africa 
is  rich.  When  H.  M.  Stanley  and  his  band  of  buccaneer- 
ing freebooters  rushed  into  the  heart  of  Africa,  was  it  not 
to  plunder  the  Africans,  and  obtain  the  wealth  of  the 
African  natives  ?  They  were  seeking  for  wealth,  for  ivory, 
for  gold.  Africa  is  a  rich  country,  and  Liberia  is  one  of 
the  richest  countries  in  Africa.     Who  are  the  Anarchists  and 


278  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Socialists?  Are  they  not  an  organization  of  poor,  hard-up 
men  who  wish  to  wring  out  money  from  the  tenacious  grasp 
of  the  wealthy  ?  Where  in  Europe  or  in  America  are  there 
not  Socialists?  There  are  Anarchists  and  Socialists  in 
Britain,  Anarchists  and  Socialists  in  France,*  Anarchists 
and  Socialists  in  Germany,  Nihilists  in  Russia,  Socialists 
and  Anarchists  in  Austro-Hungary,  Socialists  and  Anarchists 
in  Italy,  and,  indeed,  all  Europe  over ;  there  are  Socialists 
and  Anarchists  in  the  United  States  of  North  America.  But 
there  are  no;  Socialists,  no  Nihilists,  no  Anarchists,  in 
Liberia?  And  why?  Because  Liberia  is  a  rich  countr}', 
and  has  wonderful  resources.  There  wealth  is  more  pro- 
portionately divided  than  it  is  in  any  other  country.  Liberia 
has  gold,  ivory,  copper,  iron,  and  what  not. 

We  are,  again,  informed  by  Mr.  Charles  H.  J.  Taylor, 
through  Laird  Clowes,  that  Liberia  is  '  a  land  of  superstition 
and  death.'  No  comments  from  us  are  necessary  here  in 
relation  to  superstition,  for  we  have  dealt  with  the  subject 
at  length.  But  the  Liberians  as  a  nation  are  not  super- 
stitious. In  the  fourth  Chapter  we  prove  that  not  only  the 
Europeans  and  the  Americans,  but  also  the  Asiatics,  are 
superstitious. 

Mr.  Taylor  alleges  that  there  is  death  in  Liberia;  but 
does  he  forget  the  fact  that  death  is  everywhere,  and  that 
all  men  must  die?  Liberia,  far  from  being  'a  land  of 
snakes,  centipedes,  fever,  miasma,  poverty,  superstition, 
and  death,'  we  assert  and  maintain,  is  one  of  the  loveliest 
and  grandest  spots  in  God's  earth. 

Liberia  is  the  Fatherland  which  the  American  Africans 
must  seek.  Can  it  be  possible  that  there  are  not  more 
than  1,000,000  of  them  who  wish  to  move  away  from  the 
land  of  oppression,  and  repatriate  themselves  in  the  land 

*  The  French  Anarchists  are  at  this  moment  keeping  the 
Minister  of  the  Interior  and  Prefect  of  Police  fully  employed. 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  279 

of  their  fathers — in  dear  Liberia?  The  Africans  are 
oppressed  in  the  United  States,  and  cannot  the  10,500,000 
of  them  agitate  for  Repatriation  and  Liberia  ?  March  some 
day  they  must ;  and  they  must  march  from  the  Land  of 
Goshen — from  Babylon.  But  it  must  be  to  Africa — it  must 
be  to  Liberia. 

Laird  Clowes  advocates  emigration  to  the  Congo  Free 
State  by  the  American  Africans ;  but  we  point  out  that 
Liberia  is  altogether  more  desirable,  and  a  more  fitting 
Fatherland.  Laird  Clowes,  again,  suggests  that  'for  the 
half-breed  of  the  South  another  haven  must  be  sought' 
(than  the  Congo  Free  State).  '  He  is  no  more  the  friend 
of  the  black  than  he  is  of  the  white.  Neither  desires  his 
company.  But  in  the  West  Indies,  or  in  some  parts  of 
South  and  Central  America,  he  might,  no  doubt,  discover 
a  land  in  which  his  existence  would  be  a  not  unpleasant 
one.'  How  comes  Laird  Clowes  to  know  that  the  mixed- 
blooded  African  'is  no  more  the  friend  of  the  black  than 
he  is  of  the  white  '  ?  We  say  that  he  is  '  the  friend  of  the 
black,'  and  in  many  instances  even  of  the  American  white. 
The  half-blooded  African  *  is  not  the  friend  of  the  black ' ! 

Is  Mr.  Clowes  aware  that  there  are  half-blooded  Africans 
in  Liberia  as  there  are  in  Hayti  ?  Is  Mr.  Clowes  aware 
that  the  mixed-blooded  Africans  in  Liberia  and  in  Hayti 
enjoy  not  only  full  citizenship  and  live  on  terms  of  friend- 
ship and  brotherly  love  with  their  full-blooded  African 
countrymen,  but  that  they  have,  in  many  instances,  risen 
to  the  Presidential  Chair,  both  of  Liberia  and  Hayti  ?  Is 
Laird  Clowes  aware  that  the  great  Petion,  the  Haytian,  was 
not  a  full,  but  a  mixed-blooded  African?  We  say  that 
the  full-blooded  and  half-blooded  Africans  must  move  and 
march  together,  for  they  are  one  people,  and  have  one 
common  destiny.  They  must  live  together.  When  Tous- 
saint  the  Great  was  bravely  battling  for  the  Independence 


28o  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

of  his  Haytian  Fatherland,  he  had  half-blooded  Haytians, 
his  countrymen,  in  his  Army.  So  had  Dessalines  and 
others.  And  must  the  half-blooded  Africans  betake  them- 
selves to  the  West  Indies  ?  If  so,  to  what  part  ?  Every 
part  of  the  West  Indies  is  unsuited  to  the  African,  whether 
he  be  full-blooded  or  half-blooded.  Or  must  the  half- 
blooded  African  go  to  South  or  Central  America,  as  Laird 
Clowes  suggests  ?  Neither  South  nor  Central  America,  no 
matter  what  part,  is  a  fitting  place  for  the  African.  We 
should  suggest  Liberia  as  a  fitting  and  the  only  Fatherland 
for  the  half-blooded  African.  There  he  will  enjoy  peace  and 
happiness.  There  he  will  be  a  citizen,  and  not  a  semi-slave, 
as  he  almost  always  is  in  the  United  States.  Every  office  will 
be  open  to  him.  His  progress  cannot  be  retarded  in  Liberia. 
All  Africans,  whether  they  be  half  or  whole  blooded,  are  to 
march  to  Liberia,  the  Land  of  the  Free,  the  Light  of  Africa, 
in  preference  to  the  Congo  Free  State,  or  any  other  State. 

The  Puritans,  because  they  were  persecuted  at  home  by 
the  Second  Stuart,  and  despaired  of  their  country,  directed 
their  steps  to  America,  and  founded  the  United  States ; 
and  will  the  persecuted  Africans  of  the  United  States 
remain  therein  ?  Charles  I.  prevented  John  Hampden  and 
Oliver  Cromwell,  Independents  or  Puritans,  from  migrating 
to  America;  but  the  former  remained  to  perish  fighting 
valiantly  against  the  King  at  Chalgrove  Field ;  while  the 
latter,  Oliver  Cromwell,  lived  to  sign  the  death-warrant  of 
the  King,  who  was  beheaded  at  Whitehall.  We  believe, 
like  the  Rev.  Mr.  Lee,  that  the  Africans  must  march  out  of 
the  United  States.  We  believe  it  must  be  to  Africa.  We 
believe  they  must  be  independent.  And  we  indulge  in  the 
dream  that  they  will  betake  themselves  to  the  Independent 
Republic  of  Liberia. 

The  Turks,  because  they  were  persecuted  at  home  in 
Central  Asia,  and  were  unwilling  to  live  as  the  subjects  of 


REPA  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  281 

the  Mongols,  fled  from  Central  Asia,  with  their  wives  and 
children  and  whatever  they  possessed,  and  marched  into 
Europe,  conquered  a  part  of  it,  and  are  still  there.  And 
will  the  Africans  in  the  United  States  of  North  America, 
oppressed  and  lynched  as  they  are,  and  deprived  of  their 
rights  by  the  Yankees,  continue  to  live  in  America? 

In  1840  the  Boers,  because  they  were  dissatisfied  with 
the  British  Colonial  Government  at  the  Cape  Colony, 
quitted  that  Colony,  and  entrenched  themselves  in  Natal, 
where  the  jealous  Britishers  followed  them.  Nothing 
daunted  by  the  annexation  of  their  new  home.  Natal,  by 
the  Britishers,  they  quitted  Natal  and  founded  the  Trans- 
vaal. Britishers  again  followed  them  there  in  1877.  For 
three  years  the  Boers  bore  the  uninviting  attentions  of 
Britishers,  but  in  1880  they  rose  in  rebellion,  took  the  field, 
and  the  Britishers,  though  they  were  always  better  armed 
and  numerically  at  least  equal  to  the  Boers,  suffered  signal 
defeats.  But  it  was  the  decisive  battle  of  Amajuba  that 
shed  the  greatest  lustre  on  the  arms  of  the  Boers,  and 
secured  to  them  Independence  and  the  possession  of  the 
Transvaal,  while  the  beaten  Britishers  returned  home 
crestfallen  from  Amajuba,  leaving  their  commander-in-chief, 
and  the  flower  of  the  youth  of  England,  Ireland,  and  Scot- 
land on  the  field  of  battle.  The  courage  of  the  Boers  was 
a  noble  one.  They  disliked  British  rule;  they  preferred 
freedom  and  independence. 

The  Africans  in  the  United  States  are  not  citizens,  but 
subjects.  Formerly  they  were  a  nation  of  slaves,  now  they 
are  a  nation  of  servants.  They  are  not  protected  by  the 
American  law.  Will  they  remain  in  that  land  ?  Time,  no 
doubt,  will  show.  There  are  those  who  say  that  we  are  preach- 
ing removal  from  the  United  States  to  a  people  who  have  no 
money.  We  say  that  there  are  two  things  that  the  African  in 
the  United  States  must  do  or  have.     First,  he  must  have  tlie 


282  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

will  to  quit  the  United  States  ;  and  surely  the  Africans,  who 
are  ill-treated,  unprotected,  and  enjoy  no  rights  whatever, 
ought  to  be  only  too  willing  to  quit  the  United  States.  If 
he  has  the  will,  then,  secondly,  the  African  must  organize 
his  ranks,  agitate  for  removal,  and  bring  the  Yankee  to  his 
senses.  Then  only,  we  are  sure,  but  only  then,  will  he 
receive  the  money  that  the  American  owes  him.  We 
are  afraid  the  Africans  in  America  are  too  apathetic  and 
indifferent  to  their  birthright  in  Africa,  in  Liberia.  The 
apathy  and  indifference  of  the  expatriated  African  are  con- 
strued by  the  whites  as  laziness ;  but  we  think  they  are  the 
reactions  from  slavery,  and  not  laziness.  So  long  as  they 
continue  apathetic  and  indifferent,  so  long  will  their  con- 
duct be  construed  into  laziness.  Sir  Edwin  Arnold  gives  it 
as  his  opinion  that  '  the  Africo- Americans  are  as  merry  as 
crickets,  lazy  as  pigs.'" 

The  apathy  and  indifference  of  the  Africans  are  also  con- 
strued into  inferiority  by  the  whites.  Africa  is  fast  being 
partitioned  by  the  European  Powers.  And  the  Africans  of 
the  United  States,  who  are  as  a  rule  poor,  thanks  to  slavery, 
dare  not  go  and  claim  the  land  of  their  ancestors.  In 
Africa  they  can  become  rich  with  rapid  strides.  But  it 
must  be  to  Liberia  that  they  go.  In  the  words  of  the  Hon. 
Henry  W.  Grimes,  ex- Attorney-General  of  Liberia,  who 
writes  in  the  earlier  part  of  this  year  (1891),  'Liberia  has 
in  her  all  the  elements  of  progress.  I  will  go  further,  and 
say  that  I  believe  she  will  progress  ;  but  just  at  present  I 
must  confess  that  those  on  whom  she  should  be  able  to 
depend  for  aid  in  her  work  are  strangely  indifferent  to  her 
needs.  The  cry  has  been  sent  out  across  the  water  to  the 
sons  of  Ham,  who  are  "  learned  in  the  wisdom  of  the 
Egyptians,"  "  Come  over  and  help  us  !"  but  they  heed  it 
not.      Here  and  there  one  comes ;   some  fear  to  get  sick 

*  Letter  to  the  Daily  Telegraph,  1889. 


REPA TRIA  riON  AND  LIBERIA.  283 

and  die,  as  if  disease  and  death  were  not  everywhere ;  others 
say,  "  How  can  we  leave  the  good  things  of  this  land  to  go 
to  savage  Africa  ?"  And  so,'  continues  Mr.  Grimes,  *  we 
stand  on  the  threshold,  waiting  and  watching  for  help  to  go 
up  and  possess  the  land.  Thank  God,  the  help  is  coming  ! 
Every  year  one  or  two  more  are  drawn  to  us  from  the  mass 
around,  and  they  are  useful  allies.  With  their  help  we  will 
yet  go  forward,  triumphing  and  to  triumph,  for  the  promise 
is  sure :  Ethiopia  must  stretch  forth  her  hands  to  God. 
Africa  must  be  won  for  Christ ;  and  if  our  brethren  here  in 
the  United  States  are  as  careless  of  their  birthright  as  was 
Esau,  then  the  blessing  will  go  with  it  to  him  who  appre- 
ciates it,  and  he,  in  the  long,  dark  night,  will  wrestle  with 
God,  and,  prevailing,  will  get  the  blessing  at  dawn.' 

Suppose  that  all  the  10,500,000  of  Africo-Americans, 
being  intent  on  returning  to  the  land  of  their  ancestors,  had 
marshalled  their  ranks  and  petitioned  the  Yankee  Govern- 
ment for  a  subsidy  to  enable  them  to  do  so,  and  had  the 
prayer  of  their  petition  refused,  we  do  not  doubt  that  the 
money  could  be  raised  otherwise. 

The  Independents,  in  the  time  of  the  First  Charles,  left 
England  for  America  in  ship  after  ship.  They  did  so  because 
life  was  too  hard  for  them  to  bear  under  the  iron  rule,  or, 
rather,  the  misrule,  of  the  despotic  Charles.  Charles's 
Government  did  not  aid  them  in  any  way.  It  did  not  pay 
their  passage,  or  allow  them  money  for  their  use,  and  to 
start  with  in  America.  On  the  contrary,  wrathful  that  its 
opponents  should  escape  from  its  power,  the  Government  of 
the  First  Charles  prohibited  eight  ships  of  the  Puritan  Icono- 
clasts from  quitting  the  Thames.  But  it  is  not  likely  that 
the  American  Government  would  stop  and  detain  any  ship 
laden  with  expatriated  Africans  who  were  homeward  bound 
to  their  Africa.  On  the  contrary,  the  American  Govern- 
ment would  feel  it  a  relief  if  the  Africans  were  to  suddenly 


284  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

leave.  For  there  would  be  no  more  Race  Problems  to 
confront.  No  doubt  the  American  Government  would  like 
to  see  the  Race  Problem  settled.  But  they  cannot  make  up 
their  minds  to  grant  the  Africans  a  subsidy  to  enable  them 
to  return  to  Africa.  The  Democrats  of  the  United  States 
indulge  in  tall  talk  about  sending  the  Africans  from  the 
United  States  to  the  land  of  their  ancestors  when  they  are 
out  of  office,  but  they  shirk  the  work  when  they  are  in  office. 
It  is  not  likely  that  a  Republican  Government,  like  the 
present  American  Administration,  will  ever  send  the  Africo- 
Americans  to  Africa,  and  solve  the  burning  Race  Question 
in  the  United  States. 

The  Independents,  we  were  saying,  betook  themselves  to 
America  merely  as  British  Colonists,  and  proposed  to  remain 
British  subjects.  But,  were  the  American  Africans  to  leave 
the  United  States  for  Africa,  it  would  not  be  to  be  as  mere 
colonists,  and  to  remain  subject  to  the  Caucasian,  and  to 
live  under  the  aegis  of  the  Second  Belgian  Leopold  and  his 
successors  in  the  Congo  Free  State,  as  Laird  Clowes  with 
unpardonable  simplicity  suggests,  where  they  or  their 
descendants  might  have  to  do  battle  with  the  Belgians  for 
the  exclusive  Independence  of  their  Congro  Free  State,  as 
the  descendants  of  the  Puritans  or  Independents  did  with 
the  Britishers ;  but  they  would  simply  be  leaving  America 
and  oppression  behind  them  once  and  for  ever,  and 
marching  into  Africa,  into  Liberia,  not  as  mere  colonists, 
not  as  subjects,  we  say,  but  as  fully-qualified,  independent 
citizens. 

The  Africo- Americans  should  be  able  to  raise  money  by  the 
same  means  as  the  English  Puritans  who  settled  in  America 
did  more  than  two  hundred  years  ago. 

Where  did  the  Turks,  who  fled  before  the  Mongols  and 
oppression  from  Central  Asia,  into  Europe,  find  capital  to 
facilitate  their  passage  to  the  European  Continent?     The 


REPA TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  285 

Turks  were  practically  as  poor  as  the  Puritans  were,  and  as 
the  Africans  in  the  United  States  are  now.  But  the  Turks, 
like  the  Puritans,  though  poor,  preferred  liberty  to  oppres- 
sion; and  their  thirst  for  liberty  sustained  them  on  their 
journey.  The  Turks  had  to  fight  with  the  Byzantine 
Greeks  for  a  shelter  and  a  home ;  but  were  the  expatriated 
Africans  in  the  United  States  to  quit  America,  it  would  not 
be  to  contend  with  anyone  for  a  home  and  shelter.  Their 
task  would  be  easier  and  their  path  smoother  than  were 
those  of  the  Turks.  They  need  only  sail  to  Africa,  and 
there  find  a  shelter  ;  they  need  only  march  to  Liberia,  and 
there  find  not  only  a  home,  but  Liberty,  Independence,  and 
her  daughter,  Citizenship. 

Dare  not  the  Africo-Americans,  with  more  opportunities 
and  greater  facilities,  try  to  do  what  the  Caucasians,  in  the 
persons  of  the  New  England  Independents,  and  what  the 
Asiatics,  in  the  persons  of  the  Turks,  achieved  ?  Is  it 
possible  that  our  oppressed  brethren  and  countrymen  in 
the  United  States  cannot  find  means  wherewith  to  quit 
America  and  find  a  home  in  Africa,  the  land  of  our 
ancestors  ? 

'  Where  there  is  a  will  there  is  a  way,'  they  say.  The 
countrymen  of  Moses  and  descendants  of  Jacob,  the 
Israelites,  because  their  brethren  and  co-religionists  in 
Russia  and  Poland  are  being  persecuted  and  oppressed  In- 
the  Gentiles,  have  formed  the  Anglo-Jewish  Association, 
the  Syrian  Colonization  Society,  and  other  organizations,  to 
enable  those  of  their  Russian  and  Polish  brethren  who  wisli 
it  to  return  to  the  Holy  Land.  Toiling  Hebrews  of  the 
East-End,  poor  though  they  be,  are  contributing  a  penny  a 
week  per  man  to  the  fund  of  one  of  the  Jewish  Colonization 
Societies.* 

A  penny  a  week  seems  next  to  nothing.  But  somethin-^ 
*  Lloyd's  News^   1891. 


286  THE  LONE -STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

is  surely  bettter  than  nothing ;  and  do  not  little  things  grow 
into  mighty  mountains  ?  But  have  the  Africans  in  the 
United  States  any  similar  organizations  to  enable  them  to 
return  to  their  Africa  ?  Have  they  even  one  organization 
for  such  a  purpose  ?  It  is  the  boast  of  every  African  that 
he  is  the  Caucasian's  equal,  if  not  his  superior,  while  the 
Asiatic  and  the  Red  Man,  being  immensely  his  inferiors, 
bow  down  before  the  African  in  token  of  their  inferiority. 
And  dare  not  the  African  act  as  he  ought  ? 

The  fire  which  burnt,  and  continues  burning,  in  the 
breasts  of  the  Haytians ;  the  fire  which  burnt,  and  con- 
tinues burning,  in  the  breasts  of  the  Liberians ;  and  the  fire 
which  burnt  in  the  breasts  of  our  African  forefathers 
generally,  the  Americo-African,  we  fear,  is  very  low  just  at 
present.  The  Haytians  wanted  Liberty  and  Independence. 
They  fought  for  and  got  both.  Their  enemies  were  as 
implacable  as  they  were  indefatigable.  The  Haytians  had 
the  will,  and  they  found  out  the  way.  They  wrung  both 
Liberty  and  Independence  from  the  feeble  grasp  of  the 
Gaul,  driving  the  defeated  Frenchman  into  the  sea. 

The  founders  of  Liberia,  preferring  Liberty  and  Inde- 
pendence in  '  savage  Africa '  to  Oppression  and  Non- 
Possession  of  Civil  Rights  in  the  'civilized'  United  States, 
quitted  America,  sailed  to  the  land  of  their  forefathers,  and 
founded  the  Republic  of  Liberia,  the  Land  of  the  Free. 
What  do  we  Africans  not  owe  to  these  first  settlers,  the 
colonizers,  the  founders  of  Liberia  ?  They  did  not  wait  for 
the  American  Government  to  help  them,  to  furnish  them 
with  fabulous  sums.  When  the  '  American  Colonization 
Society,'  with  characteristic  benevolence,  offered  them  a 
home  on  the  West  Coast  of  Africa,  they  (the  then 
American,  and  future  Liberian  Africans)  cheerfully,  gladly, 
and  readily  answered  to  the  call,  and  went  to  Africa.  Their 
task  in  the  land  of  their  ancestors  was  not  an  easy  one  ;  it 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  287 

was  uphill  work  for  them.  Did  not  the  encounters  they  had 
in  1835,  1857,  1875,  1876,  and  other  periods  during  their 
colonizing  march,  with  the  native  Africans,  make  their  task 
arduous  ?  But  they  surmounted  all  difficulties ;  having 
the  ivill^  they  found  out  the  way.  The  descendants  of  those 
stout  and  stubborn  men  are  enjoying  the  legacy  their  fathers 
left  them. 

The  names  of  such  men  as  Joseph  Jenkin  Roberts, 
Hilary  Leage,  Stephen  Allen  Benson,  Daniel  B.  Warner, 
James  Spriggs  Payne,  Charles  H.  Hanlon,  A.  W.  Gardner, 
G.  W.  Gibson,  A.  J.  Russell,  who  were  Liberians  of  dis- 
tinction, must  be  handed  down  to  posterity  as  a  band  of 
heroes.  What  debt  do  we  Africans,  who  hunger  after 
Independence,  not  owe  that  sturdy  band  of  heroes  ?  We 
must  follow  in  the  path  which  they  have  made. 

Cannot  the  leading  Africans  in  the  United  States  see  the 
false  position  in  which  they  stand  ? 

The  American  Government,  not  wishing  to  send  Americans 
to  Liberia  and  Hayti  to  represent  them  diplomatically 
and  commercially,  send  two  Republican  Africo-Americans 
— as  much  as  to  say  that  the  Liberians  and  Haytians  are 
not  fit  persons  to  have  white  American  Ministers,  Consuls- 
General,  and  Consuls  amongst  them. 

Comment  by  us  is  unnecessary.  The  leaders  of  the 
Africans  in  the  United  States,  however,  should  see  the  false 
position  they  stand  in.  No  American  Government,  be  it 
Republican  or  be  it  Democrat,  will  send  black  men  to 
represent  the  American  people  in  Britain,  in  France,  in 
Germany,  in  Russia,  in  Austro-Hungary,  in  Italy,  or  in 
other  Caucasian  country,  either  diplomatically  or  com- 
mercially. The  black  Ministers  and  Consuls-General  of 
the  United  States  to  Liberia  have  never  been  transferred 
to  any  Caucasian  countries.  The  American  Africans, 
Messrs.  E.  D.  Bassett,  J.  U.  Langston,  J.  E.  W.  Thomp- 


288  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

son,  who  have  been  Ministers  of  the  United  States  in 
Hayti,  have  not  been  promoted  or  sent  to  Europe  to  repre- 
sent the  United  States  there.  It  is  a  useless  thing  for  any 
leading  Africo-American  to  hope  that  he  will  ever  be  sent 
to  Europe  as  United  States  Minister. 

It  is  foolish  for  any  Africo-American  to  hope  that  some 
day  he  will  be  elected  to  the  Presidentship  of  the  United 
States.  He  shall  never  sit  in  the  chair  of  Washington, 
Jefferson  and  Madison.  It  is  foolish  for  any  African  in  the 
United  States  of  North  America  to  cherish  the  delusion  that 
some  day  he  will  be  given  a  seat  in  President  Harrison's 
Cabinet,  or  in  President  Cleveland's  Cabinet,  or  in  the 
Cabinet  of  any  other  and  future  American  President. 

It  is  foolish  for  any  African  in  the  United  States  to 
cherish  the  delusion  that  he  will  be  made  the  Chief  Justice 
or  a  Judge  of  the  United  States.  •  And  the  Africans  persist 
in  remaining  in  the  United  States.  We  doubt  not  that  if 
the  leading  men  pf  the  African  race  in  the  United  States 
were  in  Liberia,  they  would  now  be  filling  posts  of  dis- 
tinction in  that  African  Republic.  But  they  prefer  remain- 
ing in  America,  hoping  against  hope  that  one  day  they  will 
be  called  to  the  chief  offices  of  the  American  Republic.  If 
this  is  not  infatuation,  what  is  ? 

But  the  Africo- Americans  are  not  the  only  Africans  we 
should  earnestly  counsel  to  join  the  Liberian  Republic ; 
we  should  also  advise  the  British  Africans  to  join  Liberia. 
We  should  like  to  see  the  British  Africans  of  Africa,  and 
the  British  Africans  of  the  West  Indies,  Canada,  and  else- 
where on  the  American  Continent,  and  throughout  the 
British  world,  members  and  citizens  of  the  Liberian 
Republic. 

But  our  reasons  for  counselling  Emigration  from  the 
British  Colonies  are  suf^ciently  set  forth  in  our  fifth 
Chapter,  and  consequently  we  do  not  propose  to  recapitu- 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  289 

late  them  here.  The  British  Africans,  as  a  race,  enjoy  no 
civil  rights  in  the  British  Possessions. 

Where  could  the  Africo-British  go  so  well  as  to  Liberia  ? 
and  go  those  must  who  are  patriotic,  and  have  the  welfare 
of  their  race  at  heart. 

The  British  Colonies  in  Africa,  America,  and  the  West 
Indies  send  forth  yearly  their  hundreds  of  white  and  black 
young  men  to  Europe  to  study  medicine.  The  moment 
these  get  duly  qualified  to  practise  as  medical  men,  they, 
of  course,  make  it  their  business  to  return  to  the  Colonies 
from  which  they  came ;  and  when  there  they  immediately 
apply  for  Government  appointments  in  the  medical  depart- 
ment. Would  anyone  believe  that  every  white  medical 
man,  the  moment  he  applies,  is  invariably  appointed  to  the 
post  applied  for,  while  the  black  medical  man  who  also  applies 
has  his  application  refused?  Even  if  the  black  medical 
man  be  received  in  the  service  of  Colonial  Governments  at 
all,  it  can  only  be  as  a  supernumerary.  But  in  Liberia 
things  are  done  otherwise.  In  Liberia  there  can  be  no 
jealousies,  no  heart-burning.  And  why  ?  For  the  simple 
reason  that  the  black  man,  not  the  white,  rules  there. 
Almost  every  Government  office  in  Liberia  is  elective. 
Liberia,  we  say,  is  the  Mother  of  the  African  Race.  She 
is  the  Hope  of  Africans.  She  is  the  nucleus,  the  centre 
Country,  the  rallying  standard,  round  which  all  Africans 
must  gather,  her  Lone-Star  serving  as  a  beacon. 

The  British  Government  does  not  reward  merit.  Mr. 
Mitchell  Maxwell  Phillip,  now  deceased,  found  himself 
Solicitor-General  of  the  British  Colony  of  Trinidad.  He 
served  the  Colony  long  and  usefully.  He  hoped  against 
hope  that  his  services  would  have  been  rewarded  by  pro- 
motion to  the  Attorney-Generalship,  or  some  other  post  in 
or  out  of  the  Colony.  But  he  died  in  1888  only  a  Solicitor- 
General.     The  post  of  Attorney-General  of  Trinidad  before 

19 


290  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

his  death  was  vacant,  but  Downing  Street  sent  a  British 
gentleman  to  occupy  the  post  instead.  And  when  Mr. 
Maxwell  Phillip  died  in  1888,  it  was  hoped  that  some 
talented  Trinidadian  African  barrister  (and  there  are  many 
such  in  Trinidad)  would  have  succeeded  him  in  the 
Solicitor-Generalship.  But  Downing  Street  gave  it  to  a 
white  man  instead.  It  would  be  useless  for  us  to  relate 
how  the  authorities  at  Downing  Street  treat  the  British 
subjects  of  African  Race.  There  are  a  few  judges,  magis- 
trates, medical  and  law  officers  of  the  British  Crown  of 
African  Race,  we  do  admit,  but  these  never  meet  with 
promotion.  Does  there  live  the  judge,  or  magistrate,  or  any 
other  functionary  of  the  British  Colonial  Government  of 
the  African  Race  who  indulges  in  the  fond  delusion  that 
he  will  be  appointed  the  Governor  of  any  British  Colony, 
or  be  appointed  to  any  similar  function  ?  Does  the  British 
African  live  who  cherishes  the  fond  delusion  that  he  will 
()e  made  a  Chief  Justice  of  one  of  the  Colonies  of  the 
Dominion  of  Canada  or  Australia  ?  We  may  mention  here 
that  one,  and  only  one,  British  African  has  ever  been 
knighted  by  the  British  Sovereign,  and  that  one  African  is 
the  Chief  Justice  of  Barbadoes,  and  he  is  only  a  Knight 
Bachelor.  He  is  the  first  British  subject  of  African  blood 
who  has  ever  been  knighted ;  but  we  fear  much  that  he  will 
be  the  last. 

Does  the  African  subject  of  the  British  Empire  desire 
Home  Rule?     There  is  Liberia  ;  she  enjoys  hidependence. 

The  British  African  does  not  live  who  dreams  that  he 
will  be  admitted  a  Member  of  the  House  of  Lords  or  the 
House  of  Commons  ;  but  in  Liberia  he  can  be  a  Senator  or 
a  Member  of  the  House  of  Representatives. 

The  British  African  does  not  live  who  imagines  that  he 
will  be  made  a  Member  of  Her  Britannic  Majesty's  Govern- 
ment; but  in  Liberia  he  can  be  appointed  a  Member  of 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  291 

the  President's  Government.  No  British  African  can  be 
so  infatuated  as  even  to  dream  that  he  will  be  made  King 
of  Great  Britain  and  Ireland  and  Emperor  of  India ;  but  he 
can  be  elected  Liberian  President. 

Of  course  we  expect  much  opposition,  not  only  from  our 
British  Africans,  but  from  our  American  Africans  as  well, 
for  proposing  that  both  the  British  and  the  American 
Africans  should  go  to  Liberia.  We  are  confident,  however, 
that  time  and  posterity  will  justify  us  in  advising  that  all 
Africans  living  under  Caucasian  rule  should  throw  in  their 
lot  with  the  Liberian  Republic.  If  the  British  and  American 
Africans  dislike  the  idea  of  going  to  Liberia,  it  remains  to 
be  seen  whether  their  descendants  will  dislike  it.  They 
will  certainly  not  thank  their  fathers  for  failing  to  leave 
them  a  mighty  country  as  a  legacy. 

There  are  many  briefless  but  talented  African  lawyers  in 
the  over-lawyered  British  Colonies  who  are  almost  on  the 
point  of  starvation ;  but  Liberia  is  a  fine  field  for  them,  and 
would  prove  a  land  of  plenty.  Liberia  needs  talent ;  and 
why  should  not  the  British  as  well  as  the  American  Africans 
go  to  Liberia  ?  Surely  half  a  loaf  is  better  than  no  bread, 
and  there  is  more  than  sufficient  for  all  in  Liberia. 

The  African  doctors  in  the  British  Colonies  should  do 
the  same,  or  if  they  are  supernumeraries  in  Hospitals,  we 
express  the  opinion  that  it  is  better  to  practise  on  one's  own 
account  in  Liberia  than  be  a  supernumerary  in  the  Hospital 
of  a  British  Colony.  The  British  Colonies,  generally  where 
the  Africans  preponderate,  are  not  only  over-lawyered,  but 
over-doctored  as  well,  while  Liberia  needs  the  services  of  all 
these  talented  Africans. 

The  British  Crown  does  not  offer  any  incentive  to  its 
African  subjects'  ambition.  Not  in  the  least.  To  use  the 
words  of  a  man  in  close  touch  with  Lord  Salisbury's 
present  Government  (Sir  John  Gorst,   Under-Secretary  of 

19 — 2 


292  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

State  for  India)  :  '  Governments  '  {i.e.^  Caucasian  Govern- 
ments, British  particularly)  '  had  always  discouraged  inde- 
pendent and  original  talent,  and  had  always  preferred  docile 
mediocrity.  This  was  not  a  new  policy.  It  was  as  old  as 
the  days  of  Tarquinius  Superbus,  and  examples  of  its  prac- 
tice were  to  be  found  in  the  more  recent  times  of  Cete- 
wayo,  Arabi,  and  Zebehr.  In  this  he'  (Sir  John  Gorst) 
'  thought  Governments  were  very  likely  right.'"^ 

We  see  no  reason,  then,  why  the  British  African  should 
hesitate  in  joining  Liberia.  Perhaps  he  will  urge  as  a  reason 
for  his  hesitancy  the  fact  that  the  Liberian  is  based  on  the 
American  Constitution,  and  that  he  is  no  admirer  of  Yankee 
institutions.  Let  us  once  and  for  all  dispel  all  such  preju- 
dices, and  try  to  convince  him  who  would  be  convinced. 

We  shall  endeavour  to  do  so  in  this  way.  Is  it  not  a  well- 
known,  though  hard-to-be-admitted,  fact  that  the  United 
Kingdom  and  her  dependencies,  if  not  the  rest  of  the  world, 
are  slowly  but  surely  being  Yankeeized — socially,  politically, 
and  in  a  literary  point  of  view  ?  Words  such  as  cefitre, 
labour^  honour^  te?iour^  civilise^  programme^  favour^  etc.,  and 
those  derived  from  them,  are  now  being  spelt  by  many  ot 
the  British  people,  their  colonists  and  subjects,  particularly 
chose  with  Liberal  and  Radical  tendencies,  as  center,  labor, 
honor,  tenor,  favor,  civilize,  program,  etc. — all  Americanism?. 

Because  America  has  never  had  any  and  has  no  Estab- 
lished Church,  the  British  Parliament,  under  the  able 
leadership  of  Liberal  Mr.  Gladstone,  disestablished  and  dis- 
endowed the  Irish  State  Church  in  1869;  and  for  the  same 
reason  the  State  Church  in  England,  Scotland,  and  Wales 
is  being  threatened  with  extinction. 

Because  the  American  Supreme  Court  claims  and  exer- 
cises, and  has  always  claimed  and  exercised,  the  right  to 

*  Sir  John  Gorst's  speech  in  the  House  of  Commons  on  the 
Manipur  Question,  1891. 


REPA  TRIA  TION  A  ND  L  IB  ERTA .  293 

determine  questions  of  disputed  elections,  the  British  Par- 
liament assigned  and  transferred  that  right  (which  the 
House  of  Commons  had  claimed  and  exercised  from  1604 
to  1868)  by  31  and  32  Vict.,  chap.  125,  the  Parliamentary 
Elections  Act,  to  the  Court  of  Common  Pleas,  which  is 
now  exercised  by  the  Queen's  Bench  Division  of  the  High 
Court.  "^ 

Because  America  has  a  Federal  Constitution,  and  every 
State  composing  the  American  Union  is  autonomous, 
Liberals,  Radicals,  and  Nationalists  would  federate  the 
United  Kingdom  by  giving  first  Ireland,  secondly  Scotland, 
and  thirdly  Wales,  a  measure  of  Home  Rule  or  autonomy. 
Is  not  the  Constitution  of  all  the  Spanish  American  Re- 
publics, with  Germany,  Austro-Hungary,  Norway  and 
Sweden,  and  Switzerland,  more  or  less  based  on  the 
Yankee  ?  Is  not  the  British  Dom.inion  of  Canada  federated  ? 
In  other  words,  is  not  its  Constitution  or  Government 
modelled  on  the  American  ?  And  what,  we  ask,  would 
Australasian  Federation  be  like  ? 

Because  the  Yankees  pay,  and  have  always  paid,  their 
Senators  and  Representatives,  the  Canadians  are  now  pay- 
ing their  Senators  and  Commons,  the  Australasians  and 
others  of  the  British  race  pay  the  members  of  their  Legis- 
lative Council  and  Assembly.  And  do  not  the  states  of  the 
earth,  as  a  rule,  after  the  Yankee  fashion,  pay  their  legis- 
lators ?  And  will  not  the  honourable  member  for  the 
Wansbeck  Division  of  Northumberland,  Liberal  Mr.  Charles 
Fenwick,  bring  in  a  Bill  for  the  Payment  of  Members  of 
Parliament  in  the  House  of  Commons  in  the  seventh 
Session  of  the  twelfth  Parliament  of  the  British  Victoria  ? 

Because  American  women  more  or  less  enjoy  the  fran- 

■*  Taswell-Langmead's  '  English  Constitutional  History,' 
p.  356,  fourth  edition  ;  Anson's  '  Law  and  Custom  of  the  Con- 
stitution,' Part  I.,  p.  149. 


294  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

chise,  Conservative  Lord  Denman  will  in  the  House  of 
Lords,  in  the  present  (seventh)  Session  of  British  Victoria's 
twelfth  Parliament,  bring  in  his  Women's  Franchise  Bill. 

Because  the  legal  professions  are  amalgamated  in  America 
a  movement  is  on  foot  in  the  United  Kingdom  to  amalga- 
mate the  British  legal  professions.  And  are  not  the  legal 
professions  in  British  North  America,  Australasia,  British 
Africa,  and  other  British  dependencies  amalgamated  after 
the  Yankee  fashion  ?* 

Because  America  is  Protectionist,  all  the  British  depend- 
encies, and  the  rest  of  the  world  more  or  less,  glory  in 
Protection.  And  are  not  the  Right  Honourable  J.  Lowther 
and  the  honourable  and  gallant  Colonel  Howard  Vincent, 
M.P.s  who  command  a  respectable  following,  now  doing 
their  very  best  to  convert  stolid,  stiff-necked  Free-Trading 
Britishers  to  the  principles  of  Fair  Trade,  which  designation 
has  only  to  be  scratched,  and  Protection  would  be  found  in 
its  place  ? 

Though  British  coin  is  the  money  chiefly  in  circulation, 
yet  because  America  uses  the  dollars  and  cents  currency 
nearly  all  the  British  possessions  keep  their  accounts  in 
United  States  dollars  and  cents,  while  in  many  of  those 
dependencies  there  are  actually  dollar-notes  framed  after 
the  Yankee  pattern. 

Take  the  railway.  Lloyd^s  News  for  Sunday,  February  28, 
1892,  says  :  '  Railway  outrages  having  considerably  increased 
in  number  of  late  years,  obvious  interest  is  attached  to  the 
forthcoming  introduction  into  this  [British]  country  of  a 
new  train^  constructed  upon  the  American  pri?iciple^  the  dis- 
tinguishing feature  of  which  is  a  gangway  right  through  the 
carriages  from  end  to  end.  The  South-Eastern  Railway 
Company  takes  the  first  step  in  this  directio7i.  On  Wednesday 
next  Sir  Miles  Fentoti  will  despatch  a  special  train^  built  in 
*  '  Professional  Handbook,'  pp.  3-5,  11-14,  20,  2i. 


I 


REPA  TRIA TION  AND  LIBERIA.  295 

New  York  for  the  S.E.R.,  on  a  trial  trip  from  London  to 
Hastings,'  etr.,  etc. ;  the  Yankees  thereby  teaching  the 
countrymen  of  George  and  Robert  Stephenson  and  Isam- 
bard  Brunei  literally  and  truly  '  to  suck  eggs.' 

When  their  Bridsh  governors  are  being  Americanized, 
must  the  African  subjects  of  the  United  Kingdom  hang 
back  and  hesitate  and  say  that  they  are  not  enamoured  of 
Liberia  because  its  Constitution  is  based  on  the  American  ?* 

We  are  glad,  however,  to  learn  that  the  Sierra  Leoneans 
are  surely,  if  slowly,  beginning  to  see  the  necessity  and  im- 
portance of  joining  Liberia.  Liberian  Dr.  Edward  Wilmot 
Blyden,  in  his  '  Christianity,  Islam,  and  the  Ethiopian  Race,' 
page  230,  assures  us  that  '  the  progress  of  events — the 
growth  of  the  two  countries — has  shown  that  not  only  has 
Liberia  not  interfered  prejudicially  with  Sierra  Leone,  but  it 
has  presented  a  field  for  the  energies,  industrial  and  com- 
mercial, of  many  a  native  of  the  settlement.  An  interesting 
fact  in  the  present  history  of  Liberia,  which  Sir  Charles 
McCarthy  could  not  have  foreseen,  is  this — that  a  native  of 
Sierra  Leone,  brought  up  amid  the  institutions  of  the  colony, 
is  a  successor  of  Messrs.  Mills  and  Burgess  as  agent  of  the 
American  Colonization  Society,  having  charge  of  the  location 
and  rationing  of  all  emigrants  arriving  in  Liberia  from 
America.  This  native  of  Sierra  Leone  is  also  the  Mayor  of 
the  city  of  Monrovia,  the  capital  of  the  republic'  The  late 
Liberian  Consul  in,  and  a  native  of.  Sierra  Leone  is  now  a 
leading  citizen  of  the  West  African  Republic. 

*  We  do  not  mean  to  convey  the  idea,  by  our  comments  in 
the  text,  that  we  warmly  admire  all  Yankee  institutions,  or  are 
in  any  way  suffering  from  Yankeemania.  Quite  the  contrary. 
We  only  tell  the  truth,  the  whole  truth,  and  nothing  but  the 
truth.  We  are  of  opinion,  also,  that  the  Chicago  Exhibition  or 
World's  Fair  will  tend  to  further  Americanize  the  world— at 
least,  the  Caucasian  world. 


296  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

We  return  to  Laird  Clowes  for  a  moment.  Writing  on 
page  189  of  his  '  Black  America,'  amongst  other  matters, 
Laird  Clowes  says  :  '  Professor  Edward  Wilmot  Blyden, 
formerly  of  the  West  Indies,  and  more  recently  of  Sierra 
Leone,  is  another  distinguished  Negro  who  advocates 
Negro  Emigration  from  the  States.' 

As  the  purport  of  the  present  work  is  to  refute  Laird 
Clowes's  libels  and  to  disprove  his  allegations,  the  reader 
may  not  see  at  once  our  reasons  for  extracting  the  above 
passage.  We  have,  however,  our  reasons  for  so  doing. 
And  we  must  be  allowed  to  point  out  here,  in  the  first 
place,  that  though  the  Honourable  Professor  advocates 
African  Emigration  from  the  United  States  of  North 
America,  he  does  not  advocate,  and  has  never  advocated, 
African  Emigration  to  the  Congo  Free  State,  or  to  any 
other  such  State  in  Africa,  or  anywhere  else.  Dr.  Blyden 
sees  the  situation  clearly,  and  being  both  patriotic  and 
having  the  welfare  of  his  race  at  heart,  he  advocates  African 
Emigration  to  the  Independent  Republic  of  Liberia,  just  as 
we  do. 

But  that  is  not  our  only  reason  for  extracting  this  passage. 
We  wish  also  to  pomt  out  that  Dr.  Blyden  does  not  belong, 
and  never  has  belonged,  to  Sierra  Leone,  as  Laird  Clowes 
would  have  us  believe.  He  was  born  a  European  subject  and 
a  W^est  Indo-African ;  but  the  Liberian  Professor,  preferring 
Independence  to  living  as  a  subject  under  British  or  any 
other  Caucasian  rule  in  the  West  Indies,  Africa,  America, 
or  elsewhere,  in  his  youth  sailed  for  Africa  and  joined  the 
Republic  of  Liberia,  and  there  found  Independence  and 
citizenship.  He  is  a  patriot,  loves  his  Africa  and  his 
Liberia.  By  becoming  a  Liberian  Dr.  Blyden  followed  the 
patriotic  and  commendable  examples  set  him  by  Joseph 
Jenkin  Roberts,  Hilary  Teague,  Stephen  Allen  Benson, 
Daniel    B.    Warner,    James    Spriggs    Payne,    Charles     H. 


RE  PA  TRIA  riON  A  ND  LIBERIA .  297 

Hanlon,  A.  W.  Gardner,  G.  W.  Gibson,  A.  J.  Russell,  Lot 
Gary,  Elijah  Johnson,  and  other  illustrious  Liberians. 

Had  he  remained  a  European,  or  any  other  Caucasian 
subject,  Dr.  Blyden's  brilliant  talents  would  never  have 
come  to  the  fore.  But  what  will  not  Independence  pro- 
duce, encourage,  and  reward  ?  He  is  not  only  a  Professor, 
but  he  is  also  an  Author  of  great  celebrity  and  eminence. 
By  going  in  his  youth  to  Liberia  he  may  be  said  to  have 
been  bred  in  Liberia. 

We  believe — ay,  we  are  confident — that  even  in  this  our 
generation  many  other  Africans  will  follow  the  examples  set 
them  by  the  Liberian  first  settlers,  by  Blyden  and  others, 
and  become  free  and  independent  citizens  of  the  Liberian 
Republic. 

Blyden  is  known  throughout  the  English-speaking  world 
because  he  is  an  independent  free  Liberian.  His  talents 
shine  out  as  a  Liberian,  but  they  would  not  have  shone  if 
he  had  remained  a  European  subject.  Even  Laird  Clowes — 
not  the  African's  friend  by  any  means — is  bound  to  recog- 
nise Blyden's  sterling  worth,  applying,  as  he  does,  the 
epithet  '  distinguished  '  to  him.  The  New  York  Evangelist 
also  eulogizes  him  thus  :  '  Dr.  Blyden  is  a  Negro  of  pure 
blood.  Born  on  one  of  the  West  India  Islands,  he  has 
been  a  Liberian  African  from  his  youth,  and  has  won  a 
high  rank  among  the  ripest  and  foremost  scholars  of  the 
age.'  Last,  not  least,  British  Sir  Alfred  Moloney,  K.C.M.G., 
did  the  same  in  public. 

Arriving  in  Liberia  as  an  ordinary  immigrant,  Blyden 
worked  his  way  up  to  be  one  of  the  highest  servants  in  the 
service  of  the  Liberian  Republic.  He  was  Liberian 
Minister  to  the  Court  of  St.  James  from  1878  to  1883. 
Here  was  a  man  representing  the  might  and  dignity  of  the 
Liberian  Nation  in  the  British  Isles.  Does  there  live  the 
Americo-African  who    imagines,  even  for  a  moment,  that 


298  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

he  will  some  day  be  sent  to  the  Court  of  St.  James  as 
Minister  representing  the  might  and  dignity  of  the  United 
States  of  North  America  ?  Again,  Does  there  live  the  British 
African,  whether  m  British  Africa,  in  British  America, 
British  West  Indies,  or  elsewhere,  who  imagines  that  he 
will  some  day  be  sent  to  the  White  House  as  Minister 
representing  the  might  and  dignity  of  the  United  Kingdom  ? 

Let  the  reader  only  imagine  a  Caucasian  Country  sending 
a  '  Nigger '  as  Ambassador  or  Minister  to  represent  it  in 
another  Caucasian  Country  ! 

But  the  Liberian-African  lives  who  can  with  good  reason 
hope  that  he  will  some  day  be  sent  to  represent  the  might 
and  dignity  of  the  Independent  Republic  of  Liberia  either 
at  the  Court  of  St.  James,  or,  it  may  be,  in  France  at  the 
Elysee,  at  the  German  Court,  at  the  Russian  Court,  at  the 
Austro-Hungarian  Court,  in  Italy  at  the  Quirinal,  at  the 
White  House  of  the  United  States  of  North  America,  at 
the  Court  of  Madrid,  or  at  any  other  Caucasian  Court. 
,  The  African  native  can  join  the  Liberian  Republic 
with  greater  facility  than  either  the  expatriated  African  in 
the  United  States  or  the  expatriated  African  in  the  British 
Possessions  out  of  Africa  can  ;  but  though  near  at  hand,  he 
may  yet  be  far  off  if  he  has  no  wish  to  become  an  indepen- 
dent citizen  of  the  Liberian  Republic ;  and  the  expatriated 
African,  if  he  has  only  the  wish  to  become  a  Liberian,  no 
matter  how  far  distant  he  is  from  the  republic,  can  always 
surmount  his  difficulties  and  obstacles,  and  find  out  the  way 
to  betake  himself  to  Liberia  and  Independence. 

Are  the  Africans  Hving  as  subjects  of  the  Caucasians,  the 
kinsmen  of  the  Assyrians,  Carthaginians,  and  Phoenicians, 
and  other  glorious  Nations  of  the  African  Race,  and  do 
they  not  love  Independence  and  Self-government?  Can 
they  be  the  kinsmen  of  Hannibal  the  Great,  the  kinsmen 
of  Toussaint  the  Great,  the  kinsmen  of  the  Great  African 


RE  PA  TRIA  riON  A  ND  LIBERIA .  299 

National  Poetess,  the  gentle  Phyllis  Wheatley  (who, 
besides  writing  many  works,  wrote  '  The  Negro  is  equalled 
by  Few  Europeans ') ;  and  do  we,  the  descendants  of 
Ham,  disregard  and  ignore  the  appeal  and  the  cry, 
*  Come  over  and  help  us,'  of  our  kinsmen  the  Liberian 
People  ?  Liberia  is  moving  and  progressing,  but  the 
Liberians  would  move  faster  and  their  progress  would  be 
quickened  by  the  Immigration  of  Africans  who  are  now 
living  under  Caucasian  rule.  Why,  we  ask,  is  the  rapid 
growth  of  the  United  States  the  marvel  of  the  world  ?  We 
answer  that  the  only  reason  is  that  Immigration  has  set  in 
from  Europe.  Let  Africans  who  are  living  under  the  aegis 
of  the  Caucasian  migrate  to  Liberia  and  cause  her  to  grow 
faster  and  to  quicken  her  pace  and  hasten  her  progress. 

The  starving  barristers  and  solicitors,  the  starving  doctors, 
teachers  who  can  hardly  earn  a  pittance,  and  others  who 
are  not  blessed  with  this  world's  goods,  should  quit  the 
over-doctored  and  over-lawyered,  etc.,  countries,  and  join 
the  Liberian  Republic,  where  every  man's  condition  can  be 
bettered,  for  Liberia  needs  talent,  and  we  are  happy  to  say 
the  African  Race  is  a  talented  and  progressive  one. 

Liberia,  we  assert,  is  in  every  way  a  fitting  Fatherland  for 
all  Africans.  We  say  that  she  is  progressing,  but  let  us 
assume  that  Liberia  is  not  progressing,  the  Africans  who 
are  non-Liberians  ought  surely  to  be  patriotic  enough  to  go 
to  the  rescue  of  Liberia  and  make  her  progress.  But 
Liberia  is  progressing,  and  that  we  have  proved,  only  she 
can  be  made  to  hasten  her  progressive  steps  by  Immigration 
on  the  part  of  Africans  who  are  non-Liberians. 

Let  the  village  schoolmaster  of  the  African  Race,  who 
may  be  on  the  point  of  starvation,  seek  his  home  and 
country  in  Liberia ;  let  the  briefless  lawyer  of  the  African 
Race  who  may  be  on  the  point  of  starvation  seek  a  hom.e 
and  country  in  Liberia;  let  the  impecunious  doctor  of  the 


300  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

African  Race  find  a  home  and  country  and  better  his 
condition  in  Liberia. 

Liberia  is  rich,  fertile,  and  is  a  happy  hunting-ground  for 
us,  the  descendants  of  Ham,  who  must  become  as  mighty 
on  the  earth  as  our  kinsman  Nimrod  was  of  yore. 

Let  the  non-Liberian-African  cease  to  be  a  backwoods- 
man, it  may  be,  in  Carapichaima,  in  Guayaguayare,  in 
Toco,  in  Couva,  or,  it  may  be,  in  Chaguaramas  or  else- 
where, and  go  and  better  his  position  in  Liberia. 

Must  those  of  us  Africans  who  are  non-Liberians  wait 
until  our  Maker  calls  us  unto  Him,  and  sink  into  our 
Mother-Earth  'unwept,  unhonoured,  and  unsung,'  and 
'  with  none  so  poor  as  to  do  us  reverence'?  Or  must  we 
instead  go  to  our  Liberia  which  is  ready  to  welcome 
us  with  outstretched  arms,  and  help  to  build  up  the  already- 
growing  Liberia n  Empire? 

Instead  of  the  Trinidadian  Africans  striving  as  to  who 
should  be  Solicitor  or  Attorney  General,  or  a  Trinidadian 
Government  Medical  Officer,  or  a  San  Fernando  Town 
Clerk,  is  it  not  better,  we  ask,  that  these  Trinidadian 
Africans  should  be  Liberians,  since  the  Liberians  as  a 
Nation  are  happy  and  contented.  Better  to  have  a  cot  in 
one's  own  country  than  a  palace  in  the  land  of  the  stranger. 
That  was  the  patriotism  of  the  great  Sir  Walter  Scott,  and 
that  is  how  he  thought.  Throughout  all  his  writings — 
amongst  others,  '  The  Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel' — he  breathes 
nothing  but  patriotism.  And  it  is  familiar  history  that 
when  Sir  Walter,  who  was  cruising  about  in  a  British 
man-of-war  in  the  Mediterranean  for  the  benefit  of  his 
health,  began  to  perceive  that  his  life  was  approaching  its 
crisis,  and  that  he  was  about  to  pay  the  debt  due  to  nature, 
made  it  a  point,  he  even  insisted,  that  he  should  be  taken 
from  the  Mediterranean,  and  carried  across  Europe  to  his 
beloved  Caledonia,  that  he   might   have   the   pleasure   of 


REPA  TKIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  301 

dying  in  his  own  country  and  in  the  land  of  his  forefathers. 
He  expired  at  Tweedside  late  in  1832. 

The  patriotism  of  the  English  Nelson  and  of  the  Irish 
Wellington,  sturdy  and  mighty  Britishers  both  of  them,  made 
them  heroes  in  their  duty. 

The  patriotism  of  the  Africans  who  are  subject  to,  and 
living  under,  Caucasian  rule,  we  must  assert,  falls  far  short 
of  that  of  those  Africans  who  enjoy  independence. 

The  Haytians,  because  they  were  patriotic,  extorted 
Independence  from  the  Frenchmen,  and  their  descendants 
continue  to  cherish  affection  for  their  Fatherland. 

The  patriotism  of  the  first  settlers  caused  them  to  quit 
America  and  return  to  their  Africa  and  found  Liberia  ;  and 
the  Liberian  of  to-day  is  as  fond  of  his  Fatherland  as  the 
Scotsman  is  of  Caledonia. 

The  patriotism  of  the  Ashantees,  the  patriotism  of  the 
Dahomans,  etc.,  enables  them  to  keep  their  respective 
Fatherlands  intact,  independent,  and  free  from  foreign 
aggression. 

We  cannot  too  often  urge  on  the  African  who  is  subject 
to  white  rule  the  importance  of  having  a  mighty  Liberian 
Empire.  It  is  essential  that  Liberia  should  be  reinforced, 
consolidated,  and  extended,  for  Africans  throughout  the 
world  must  be  protected  by  Africans.  Does  there  live 
the  African  subject  of  the  United  Kingdom  or  of  tht^ 
United  States  who  will  look  us  in  the  face  and  maintain 
that  if  a  British  or  American  subject  of  his  (Ethiopian)  race 
were  to  be  murdered  in  Germany,  France,  Russia,  Austro- 
Hungary,  or  Italy,  the  British  or  American  Government 
would  in  any  way  trouble  themselves  concerning  the 
murdered  African  and  demand  compensation  ?  We  are 
sure  they  would  not  stir  a  finger  in  such  a  matter,  and  as 
for  asking  for  compensation,  such  a  thing  is  out  of  tlie 
question  altogether. 


302  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

We  assert  that  an  African  subject  of  the  British  Crown 
or  of  the  American  Republic  may  be  murdered  or  ill- 
treated  by  any  person  or  persons  out  of  the  territories  of 
the  American  Republic  or  the  dominions  of  the  British 
Crown  with  impunity.  In  the  British  dominions,  as  well  as 
in  the  territories  of  the  American  Republic,  an  African 
can  be  murdered  or  maltreated,  but  the  villain  who  mal- 
treats him  escapes  justice ;  and  such  outrages  occur  only 
too  frequently  in  the  United  States.  Our  remarks  apply 
equally  to  the  case  of  the  African  living  under  the  rule  of, 
and  subject  to,  other  whites. 

With  Liberia,  a  strong  Nation,  these  outrages  would  never 
occur ;  or  if  ihey  did  occur,  they  would  be  swiftly  avenged, 
and  pressure  brought  to  bear  on  the  defaulting  State.  Were 
the  American  Africans  of  the  United  States  to  leave  America 
for  Liberia,  the  Yankee  rulers  of  the  United  States  would 
have  no  Africans  to  '  lynch,'  and  otherwise  ill-treat,  and 
would  fall  to  'lynching'  one  another,  or  otherwise  ill-treat 
one  another  in  order  to  keep  their  hands  going,  or  would 
fall  to  '  lynching '  or  otherwise  outraging  foreigners  :  witness 
how  some  Italians  a  little  while  ago  were  'lynched'  by  an 
avenging  American  mob  ! 

Were  Liberia  a  mighty  country,  would  slavery  and  the 
slave  trade  prevail  in  Africa,  Turkey,  and  her  depen- 
dencies ?  The  Arab  slave-hunters  would  have  been  extir- 
pated long  ago.  As  it  is,  they  (the  Arab  man-hunters)  still 
flourish  and  prowl  about  in  Africa.  Slavery,  like  its  ally 
polygamy,  exists  in  Mahommedan  countries ;  and  we  are 
sanguine  that  the  Koran,  the  Mahommedan  Bible,  contains 
passages  in  which  slavery  is  both  commanded  and 
sanctioned.  Therefore  we  are  not  surprised  that  slavery 
should  exist  in  European  Turkey,  in  Asiatic  Turkey,  in 
Egypt,  in  Tripoli,  in  Persia,  and  throughout  the  Mahom- 
medan world.     But  Liberia,  with  a  powerful  Navy  and  an 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  303 


efficient  Army,  would  check  the  execrable  traffic  in  human 
flesh,  and  would  blockade  the  Mahommedan  ports  if  neces- 
sary. Does  the  Caucasian  bring  pressure  to  bear  on  the 
Mussulman  Turk,  and  cause  him  to  manumit  the  slaves  who 
Kuard  his  harem,  and  otherwise  do  his  dirty  work  ?  Does 
Britain,  who  has  the  copyhold  and  paramount  authority 
in  Egypt,  exterminate  the  Slavery  which  exists  in  the 
Land  of  the  Pharaohs  ?  She  does  nothing.  African 
Slavery  by  the  Semitic  Egyptian  may  be  mild  and  of  a 
domestic  nature,  but  Slavery  is  Slavery^  no  matter  what  are 
its  peculiarities,  and  it  ought  in  no  way  to  be  tolerated  in 
Egypt  by  the  British  authorities. 

Were  the  Liberians  a  mighty  People,  and  if  they  had  a 
great  Empire,  would  the  Massowah  Massacres  have  been 
perpetrated  by  the  Italians  ?  Perhaps  they  would ;  but 
would  Liberia  have  sufifered  Italian  Lieutenant  Livraghi  and 
his  associates  in  crime  to  wander  at  large  unpunished  ? 
The  Liberian  Elephant,  gentle  and  docile  though  it  be, 
would  have  fallen  like  an  avenging  Nemesis  on  Italian 
Livraghi  and  his  fellow-felons,  and  meted  out  swift  but 
*  even-handed  justice  '  to  these  bloodthirsty  Italians.  But 
unfortunately,  Liberia  is  not  a  powerful  country,  or  she  would 
have  brought  the  Italians  to  their  senses. 

Livraghi  and  his  subordinates  massacred  perhaps  a  thou- 
sand of  the  African  Natives  of  Massowah;  but  did  Mr. 
Gladstone  write  a  pamphlet  on  the  Massowah  Massacres, 
as  he  did  on  the  Bulgarian  Horrors  a  few  years  ago  ?  And 
what  could  be  the  presumed  reason  or  reasons  ?  We  answer 
by  asking.  Is  not  the  Massowah  Native  blacky  while  the 
Bulgarian  Native  is  white  ?  It  was  Turkey  which  butchered 
the  Bulgarians,  but  it  was  Italy  which  butchered  the 
Massowans.  Mr.  Gladstone  knew  that  Turkey  could  be 
crushed ;  but  Italy  is  of  greater  importance  than  Turkey, 
and  the  prudent  man  held  his  tongue.     Besides,  are  not 


304  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

the  Massowans,  in  the  opinion  of  the  white  man,  of  far 
less  importance  than  the  Bulgarians  ?  and,  for  all  we  know, 
the  Liberal  Chief  might  not  have  heard  of  the  Massowah 
Horrors,  the  Massowan  being  too  small  a  fry  for  the  British 
Press  to  take  much  cognizance  of. 

Did  we  see  in  large  type  in  the  British  Press,  '  Perse- 
cution of  the  Massowans  by  the  Italians,'  or,  better  still,  the 
'  Massowah  Horrors '  ?  Let  the  Jews  and  the  Poles  be 
persecuted  and  slaughtered  by  the  Russians  ;  let  the  Jews 
be  slaughtered  by  the  Greeks  in  Corfu,  or  other  places,  and 
we  should  have  a  plentiful  supply  of  these  large-type 
headings.  The  Massowah  Natives  were  not  favoured  with 
leading  articles,  which  are  the  especial  property  of  the  Poles 
and  Jews  ;  they  were  relegated  to  an  obscure  corner  in  the 
newspapers  which  referred  to  the  matter.  Did  the  British 
Foreign  Anti-Slavery  Society"^  take  any  action  when  the 
Massowah  Massacres  became  known  ?  Did  the  Aborigines 
Protection  Society  take  any  steps  in  the  matter  ?  Were 
there  any  Mansion  House  and  Guildhall  indignation  meet- 
ings held  to  protest  against  the  cruel  and  heartless  treat- 
ment of  the  People  of  Massowah  by  the  Italians  ?  Did 
they  send  a  Memorial  to  the  King  of  Italy  requesting  him 
to  punish  the  malefactors,  and  to  use  his  influence  to  prevent 
his  Italian  subjects  from  ill-treating  the  Natives  of  Massowah? 
Did  the  Five  Great  European  Powers — Britain,  France, 
Russia,  Germany,  Austro- Hungary — address  a  Collective 
Note  to  the  Sixth  Great  European  Power,  Italy,  command- 
ing it  not  only  to  punish  the  perpetrators  of  the  Massacre, 
but  to  take  steps  that  no  more  Massacres  should  occur  at 

■^  We  absolutely  decline  with  thanks  the  '  protection  '  of  these 
two  'philanthropic'  societies.  We  shall  have  none  of  their 
'  protection.'  We  should  not  be  sorry  if  they  were  to  come  to 
grief. 


RE  PA  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  305 

Massowah  ?  They  did  nothing  of  the  kind  ;  but  were  some 
petty  Balkan  State  in  question,  the  Great  European  Powers 
would  not  have  hesitated  to  address  such  a  Collective  Note 
to  the  Sick  Man  at  the  Ottoman  Porte. 

We  agree  with  Laird  Clowes  when  he  suggests  that  the 
European  Nations  should  help  the  American  Government 
pecuniarily  in  effecting  the  removal  of  the  African  from  the 
United  States  to  Africa ;  but  we  are  not  in  agreement  with 
the  same  gentleman  when  he  suggests  that  the  Americo- 
African  should  be  sent  to  the  Congo  Free  State.  We  are 
convinced  that  Liberia  is  the  only  fitting  place  for  the 
Africo- American. 

The  American  whites  owe  the  Americo-Africans  a  heavy 
debt.  And  should  they  wish  to  discharge  that  debt,  they 
should  by  all  means  do  it  quickly.  We  are  confident  in 
asserting  that  even  if  the  American  Government  should  be 
actuated  by  the  desire  of  assisting  African  Emigration  from 
America  to  Africa,  there  would  be  those  of  the  Africans 
who  would  wish  to  remain  in  the  United  States ;  but  these 
by  no  means  should  have  pressure  brought  to  bear  on  them. 
Emigration  from  the  United  States  should  be  free  in  every 
way,  because  the  Americo-Africans  are  now  a  free  people. 
Come  what  may,  however,  it  is  the  generally  received  opinion 
that  some  day,  it  may  not  be  in  this  our  generation,  the 
Americo-Africans,  one  and  all,  must  leave  the  United 
States. 

There  is  one  point  on  which  Laird  Clowes  and  the 
Africo-American,  opposites  and  extremes  though  they  be, 
are  singularly  yet  worthily  in  agreement.  And  that  one 
point  is  this,  they  both  cherish  the  hope,  the  vain  hope  and 
fond  delusion,  that  the  white  man  will,  of  his  own  will, 
come  to  the  rescue  of  the  African ;  and  the  Americo- 
African  actually  waits  expecting  that  help  from  the  White 
Man's  Government.     We  call  that  hope  a  vain  hope,  a  fond 

20 


3o6  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

delusion.  If  it  is  not,  what  is  it  ?  That  we  are  justified  in 
calling  this  a  vain  hope  we  shall  attempt  to  prove  in  the 
following  pages. 

Before  we  show  the  relations  of  the  white  man  with  the 
black  man,  we  must  cast  a  glance  backward  at  the  ancient 
period  of  the  world,  and  observe  how  the  rich  white  has 
treated  the  poor  white. 

It  is  familiar  history  that  there  was  Grecian  Slavery  ;  that 
in  days  long  ago  Greek  enslaved  Greek,  and  Greek  enslaved 
Barbarian.  We  know  that  the  stern  Spartans,  after  taking 
Helos  by  storm,  reduced  her  inhabitants  to  a  state  of 
bondage ;  and  we  know  that  even  Athens,  the  Mother  of 
the  Arts  and  European  Civilization,  like  the  rest  of  Greece 
generally,  had  slaves. 

It  is  familiar  history  that  there  was  Roman  Slavery,  when 
Latin  deprived  Latin  and  non-Latin  of  their  liberty.  The 
rich  and  powerful  Italian,  like  the  Greek,  enslaved  his  poor 
countrymen,  and  the  conquered  stranger,  with  an  avowed 
reason,  however  unjustifiable  that  reason  may  have  been. 

It  is  familiar  history  also  that  there  was  Hindoo  Slavery, 
when  the  Hindoo  owned  his  fellow-man.  As  it  is  also 
familiar  history  that  there  was  Russian  Serfdom  in  our  own 
time,  the  poor  and  lowly  Muscovite  owning  the  haughty  and 
opulent  Muscovite,  his  countryman,  as  his  lord  and  master. 
It  is  also  a  matter  of  common  knowledge  that  there  was 
Anglo-Saxon  Slavery,  from  time  immemorial  to  so  late  as 
the  Plantagenet  period.  But  what  were  Grecian,  Roman, 
Hindoo,  and  Anglo-Saxon  Slavery  and  Russian  Serfdom 
in  comparison  with  African  Slavery  by  the  Caucasian, 
particularly  by  the  Britisher,  the  Yankee,  and  the  French- 
man ?  Were  they  not  of  far  less  importance  and  gravity 
than  African  Slavery?  The  Grecian,  Roman,  Hindoo, 
Russian,  aijd  Anglo-Saxon  Slaves  were  generally  of  the  same 
colour  as  their  rrtasters,  and  often  of  the  same  race.     These 


REPA  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  307 

slaves  were,  as  a  rule,  not  uneducated.  They  were  not,  as 
a  class  and  corporate  whole,  kept  in  ignorance.  They  lived 
in  the  midst  of  their  masters'  families,  and  not  rarely  filled 
positions  of  trust  and  honour. 

We  have  not  heard  of  the  Hindoo  slave  rising  in  insur- 
rection against  his  Hindoo  master.  We  have  not  heard  of 
the  Anglo-Saxon  slave  rising  in  insurrection  against  his 
Anglo-Saxon  or  Norman  master.  We  have  not  heard  of 
the  Russian  slave  rising  in  arms  against  his  Russian  master. 

History  tells  us  that  only  in  very  few  instances  have 
the  helots  taken  to  arms  against  their  masters  of  Greece ; 
while  history  also  teaches  us  that  only  in  very  few  instances 
have  the  Roman  slaves  been  compelled  to  fly  to  arms,  and 
levy  war  on  their  Roman  lords  and  masters,  the  most 
notable  instance  being  the  uprising  of  Thracian  Spartacus 
and  his  heroic  band  of  fellow-captives.  But,  after  all, 
'  Roman  slavery  at  its  worst  was  a  humane  institution  com- 
pared with  the  slavery  of  the  Negroes.'"^ 

What  was  the  slavery  of  the  Africans  by  the  whites, 
particularly  by  the  Yankee,  Frenchman,  and  Britisher,  like  ? 

The  slavery  instituted  in  1442  by  Portuguese  Prince 
Henry  the  Navigator;  in  15 17  by  Bartolome  de  las  Casas, 
Bishop  of  Mexican  Chiapa,  who  gave  out  that  one  African 
was  worth  four  Red  Indians;  and  in  1562  by  Captain  Sir 
John  Hawkins,  all  three  of  infamous  and  execrable  memory, 
was  a  'compound  of  everything  that  was  vile.'  African 
slavery  by  the  white  man  was  of  such  a  type  that  the 
African  slave  often  flew  to  arms.  Martial  law  was  para- 
mount in  every  locality  where  there  was  slavery.  Yet  that 
did  not  deter  the  Africans  from  repeatedly  flying  to  such 
arms  as  they  could  obtain.  But  the  European  and  American 
troops,  efficiently  armed  as  they  were,  did  not  find  it  an 
uphill  work  to  subdue  inadequately-armed  men. 

■^  Hunter's  '  Introduction  to  Roman  Law,'  chap,  ii.,  p.  i8. 

20 — 2 


3o8  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

The  Africans  rose  in  Jamaica;  the  Africans  rose  in 
Barbadoes ;  the  Africans  rose  in  Dominica ;  the  Africans 
rose  in  Martinique,  and  sundry  other  places  in  the  West 
Indies  and  the  Americas ;  but  every  attempt  of  theirs  was 
fruitless — it  was  nipped  in  the  bud  by  the  white  man's 
power.  The  African  rose  in  Hayti ;  he  rose  in  his  might 
in  August,  1 791,  under  the  leaderships  of  Jean  Francois 
and  Biassou,  and  continued  to  struggle  for  freedom  until 
the  Liberator  of  San  Domingo,  Toussaint-L'Ouverture, 
came  upon  the  scene,  when  that  great  master  of  war,  in 
a  comparatively  short  space  of  time,  gave  his  Haytians  both 
Liberty  and  Independence. 

The  African  slave,  unlike  the  white  and  Asiatic  slaves, 
was  kept  in  ignorance.  White  law,  white  public  opinion, 
and  white  custom,  imposed  ignorance  on  the  African  slave. 
He  did  not,  like  the  white  or  Asiatic  slaves,  fill  posts  of 
trust  and  honour.  The  drudging  work  of  the  cane-fields 
was  his,  with  hardly  a  shirt  to  his  back,  and  even  then  he 
was  half  starved. 

The  white  or  Asiatic  debtor  who  was  unable  to  discharge 
his  debt  became,  according  to  law,  the  slave  of  his  creditor. 
The  white  or  Asiatic  was  reduced  to  bondage  also  in 
another  way.  If  he  was  conquered  in  war,  he  became  the 
slave  of  his  conqueror,  according  to  the  former  law  of 
nations.  Neither  of  these  cases  applies  to  the  African. 
The  African  was  not  the  white  man's  debtor,  while  the  laws 
which  decreed  that  the  conquered  must  be  his  conqueror's 
slave  had  long  since  been  obsolete.  But  the  African  was 
unsuspectingly  kidnapped,  and  by  main  force,  by  those  to 
whom  he  had  given  hospitality.  We  do  not  propose  to 
enter  on  a  discussion  here  as  to  how  many  Africans  perished 
in  the  Middle  Passage  and  during  slavery,  and  their  suffer- 
ings generally  during  that  period,  for  they  are  sufficiently 
known   to   the   world.      Suffice   it   to   add   here   that   the 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  309 

Christian  Church  was  the  'bulwark  of  slavery,'  for  the 
Reverend  Slaveholders  were  legion.  And  when  the  British 
Government  emancipated  the  British  African  in  ever- 
memorable  August,  1838,  instead  of  compensating  the 
African  for  his  losses  and  sufferings,  it  indemnified  the 
Reverend  Slaveholders,  with  the  Planters  and  others,  for 
their  supposed  losses  through  African  emancipation. 

The  British  and  other  nations  are  now  engaged  in  Africa 
in  endeavouring  to  Christianize  and  civilize  the  aboriginal 
African.  The  British,  French,  Italians,  Germans,  Spaniards, 
Portuguese  and  Belgians  ought  surely  to  be  aware  that 
their  efforts  are  not  only  vain  and  fruitless,  but  also  that 
they  are  not  genuine  philanthropy.  If  Africa  is  to  be 
civilized  and  won  for  Christ,  the  only  true  way  for  effecting 
this  twofold  object  is  to  bring  back  the  captive  tribes  of 
Africans  from  America  and  the  West  Indies.  Only  Africans 
can  civilize  Africa ;  ihey  only  can  Christianize  Africa ;  they 
only  can  put  down  slavery  and  the  slave  trade.  Were  the 
European  nations  in  Africa  actuated  by  genuine  philan- 
thropic motives,  that  is  what  they  would  do.  They  would 
assist  the  African  of  the  American  Continent  and  Islands 
to  migrate  to  Africa,  his  Fatherland. 

John  Brown,  who  fought  for,  and  suffered  martyrdom 
on  behalf  of,  the  American  African,  was  a  genuine  phi- 
lanthropist. Elijah  P.  Lovejoy,  the  Martyr,  earned  the 
Martyr's  Crown  for  the  sake  of  the  African  because  he 
loved  him.  Gerrit  Smith,  who  gave  120,000  acres  of  land 
to  the  Africans  in  the  United  States,  was  a  genuine 
philanthropist.  Miss  Kate  Drexeli  (Sister  Catherine, 
Catholic  Superior  of  the  Convent  of  the  Holy  Sacrament), 
who  gave  over  ;^i, 000,000  to  the  Africans  and  Indians  of 
the  United  States,  is,  without  the  shadow  of  a  doubt,  a 
genuine     philanthropist."^       The     American     Colonization 

*  We,  in  the  name  of  the  Ethiopian  race,  sincerely  thank 
Miss  Kate  Drexeli  for  her  munificent  gift. 


3IO  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

Society,  which  has  done  and  is  doing  such  priceless  yeoman 
service  to  the  Ethiopian  race,  is  genuinely  philanthropic. 
But  what  philanthropy  does  the  European  in  Africa 
possess?  The  European  has  as  much  philanthropy  as 
Stanley.  The  European  has  gone  to  Africa,  not  to  civilize 
and  Christianize  the  African,  but  to  impoverish  him  and 
ruin  him.  He  has  gone  to  ease  the  African  of  his  terri- 
tories, his  gold,  his  silver,  his  ivory,  and  for  profit  and 
riches  generally. 

The  European  brought  in  the  train  of  his  Civilization 
and  Christianity  the  Liquor  Traffic  into  Africa,  which  is 
doing  woeful  harm  to  the  African  Aborigines,  especially  to 
those  who  come  across  the  fire-water  for  the  first  time. 

German  Arminius,  fighting  for  Independence,  surrounded 
and  annihilated  the  Roman  legions  of  Varus,  and  secured 
Independence.  When  the  Roman  Emperor  Augustus 
heard  that  Varus  and  his  soldiers  had  experienced  not  only 
defeat,  but  extermination,  at  the  hands  of  German  Arminius, 
he  exclaimed :  '  Varus,  Varus,  give  me  back  my  legions  !' 
He  said  very  little,  and  never  contemplated  sending 
another  expedition  into  Germany  to  subdue  German 
Arminius  and  his  countrymen.  He  never  entertained  the 
thought  for  a  moment  of  taking  the  Liberator  of  Germany 
captive,  and  bringing  him  to  Italy.  Arminius,  Augustus 
knew,  was  a  white  man  like  himself,  though  he  did  not 
belong  to  the  same  race  as  he  did. 

American  George  Washington,  with  the  active  co-opera- 
tion and  assistance  of  the  French,  Spaniards,  and  Dutch, 
and  with  the  countenance  of  Russia,  Sweden,  and  Den- 
mark, fought  for  and  won  Independence  for  his  Fatherland, 
the  United  States ;  and  this  he  might  not  have  gained  had 
the  above-named  powers  not  assisted  him  both  with  men 
and  money  and  munition  of  war.  The  British,  much  as 
they  disliked  parting  with  the  American  Colonies,  had  to 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  311 

concede  Independence  to  the  United  States.  They  did 
not,  after  the  War  of  American  Independence,  send  an 
expedition  to  reconquer  the  United  States,  and  seize  George 
Washington,  treacherously  or  not  treacherously,  and  convey 
him  a  prisoner  to  Britain.  They  took  no  such  steps  as 
these ;  for  American  Washington  was  their  kinsman,  and  a 
white  man. 

Venezuelan  Simon  Bolivar  liberated  Venezuela,  Peru, 
Columbia,  Ecuador,  and  Bolivia  from  the  yoke  of  the 
Castilian;  but  the  Spaniard  did  not,  after  the  Indepen- 
dence of  the  five  named  States  was  acknowledged,  send  an 
expedition  to  reconquer  these,  and  treacherously  seize  their 
Liberator,  Simon  Bolivar.  Venezuelan  Bolivar  had  white 
blood  in  his  veins  and  was  related  to  the  Castilian. 

Chilian  San  Martin  de  Jose,  with  the  active  co-operation 
of  British  Cochrane,  the  first  Earl  of  Dundonald  (and,  next 
to  Nelson,  the  greatest  Admiral  Britain  has  ever  produced), 
and  sundry  other  Britishers,  and  supported  by  American 
public  opinion,  gave  Independence  to  Chili  and  Argentina, 
and  other  Countries  on  the  American  Continent,  and  freed 
them  from  the  yoke  of  the  Spaniard.  But  the  Spaniard  did 
not  in  revenge  send  another  expedition  to  reconquer  those 
countries.  The  Castilian  did  not  attempt  to  treacherously 
seize  San  Martin  de  Jose.  For  De  Jose  had  not  only 
white  blood,  but  he  claimed  consanguinity  with  the  Cas- 
tilian, with  the  Spaniard. 

Mexican  Iturbide  is  reputed  to  be  the  Liberator  of 
Mexico.  After  that  personage  gave  Independence  to  his 
country  the  Spaniards  did  not  try  to  reconquer  Mexico; 
they  did  not  send  an  expedition  into  Mexico  with  orders 
to  take  Iturbide  prisoner  in  a  faithless  manner,  for  Mexican 
Iturbide  was  a  white  man,  and  claimed  a  Spanish 
ancestry. 

Boer  Joubert  is  the  Liberator  of  the  Transvaal ;  for  he  it 


312  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

was  who  defeated  Britain  at  Amajuba  in  1881,  and  ex- 
torted Independence  from  the  reluctant  Britishers.  But 
the  British  did  not,  on  account  of  their  disasters,  seize 
Joubert,  Kriiger,  and  Smit  Far  from  it ;  and  why  ? 
Because  Joubert  and  his  Boers  of  the  Transvaal,  being  the 
descendants  of  Dutchmen,  are  white,  and  the  Britisher  is  of 
the  same  Low  German  Family  as  the  Dutchman.  There- 
fore, the  Boers  of  the  Transvaal  were  left  unmolested  after 
Amajuba  Hill. 

But  when  the  Haytians  were  bravely  battling  for  Liberty 
and  Independence  against  the  Frenchmen,  what  European 
Country,  what  European  nation,  was  there  that  stirred  a 
finger  on  their  behalf?  No  nation  thought  for  an  instant 
of  marching  to  the  assistance  of  San  Domingo ;  the  Hay- 
tians, unlike  the  Americans,  who  received  the  active  assist- 
ance of  the  French,  Spaniards,  and  Dutchmen,  while 
Russia,  Denmark,  and  Sweden  countenanced  them — the 
Haytians,  unlike  the  Spanish-American  Colonists, ■**■  who 
received  the  countenance  of  many  civilized  nations  of  the 
earth,  while  British  soldiers  and  sailors  fought  by  their  side 
— the  Haytians,  unlike  the  Greeks,  who  had  the  might  of 
the  British,  French,  and  Russians  fighting  on  their  behalf, 
when  they  were  struggling  for  Independence,  were  left  to 
fight  out  their  battles  singlehanded  and  alone,  as  best  they 
could.  They  received  no  sympathy  and  no  countenance 
from  the  white  man,  as  did  the  Germans,  the  Belgians,  and 
the  Boers  of  the  Transvaal  when  they  were  fighting  for 
Independence. 

The  Haytians,  unlike  the  British-American  and  Spanish- 
American  Colonists,   the  Greeks,  the  Germans,  Belgians, 

■^  President  Potion,  of  Hayti,  supplied  Venezuelan  Simon 
Bolivar  with  four  Haytian  battalions,  who  in  1816  covered 
themselves  with  imperishable  renown  when  fighting  against  the 
Spanish  Royalists  on  the  plain  of  Savannah. 


RE  PA  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  313 

and  Transvaal  Boers  and  Swiss,  fought  not  only  for  Inde- 
pendence, but  also  for  Liberty. 

The  Haytians  of  Fran9ois  Dominique  were  few  in 
number,  but  they  were  mighty,  stalwart,  and  plucky  men. 
They  were  a  devoted,  fearless  band  of  heroes.  But  what 
will  not  heroic  souls  undertake,  what  will  they  not  achieve, 
with  a  Toussaint  the  Great  at  their  head  to  lead  them? 
Toussaint  the  Great  and  his  Haytians  not  only  resolved  to 
fight  for,  but  to  win,  their  Liberty  and  Independence.  The 
struggle  which  Biassou  and  Jean  Francois  began  in  August, 
1791,  was  continued  under  Toussaint  the  Great  in  1793. 
Toussaint  not  only  took  the  field,  but  he  joined  battle  with 
the  Frenchmen.  He  did  not  merely  grapple  with  and  fight, 
but  he  defeated  the  Frenchmen.  To  defeat  them  in  battle 
was  of  great  moment ;  but  the  Haytian  soldiers  of  L'Ouver- 
ture  did  more  than  that :  they  subdued  the  Frenchmen, 
and  almost  annihilated  them.  The  Frenchmen  who  were 
left  were  expelled  from  San  Domingo  or  took  to  flight  of 
their  own  accord,  putting  a  long  space  between  themselves 
and  the  Haytian  bayonets. 

Far  from  helping  the  Haytians,  the  white  men,  in  the 
persons  of  the  British  and  Spaniards,  tried  to  wrest  Inde- 
pendence from  the  Haytians.  General  Maitland  and  his 
British  countrymen  came  to  grapple  with  Toussaint  the 
Great,  but  Maitland  was  no  match  for  the  Haytian 
Liberator;  he  was  compelled  to  return  home  disappointed. 
The  arrogant  Castilian  tried  his  hand  also,  but  Toussaint 
the  Great  easily  drove  the  Spaniard  into  the  sea.  The 
history  of  the  Haytian  struggles  for  Liberty  and  Indepen- 
dence is  unique ;  it  is  without  a  parallel.  Here  were  the 
Haytians,  enjoying  practical  Independence  from  the  French- 
men. Yet,  because  the  Haytians  are  Africans,  they  must 
needs  be  attacked  by  the  British  and  Spaniards.  The 
Americans,   after   they  had  achieved  Independence,   were 


314  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

not  attacked  by  any  nation.  Mexico,  Central  America, 
Chili,  Argentina,  Peru,  Bolivia,  Venezuela,  Ecuador, 
Columbia,  after  they  gained  their  Independence  from  the 
Spaniards,  and  like  the  Belgians,  after  they  extorted  Inde- 
pendence from  the  Dutch,  and  like  the  Greeks,  after  they 
won  their  Independence  from  the  turbaned  Turk,  were  not 
molested  by  any  individual  or  united  States.  But  the 
Haytians  were  molested  by  the  British  and  by  the 
Spaniards.  Said  they :  '  What  right  under  Heaven  have 
the  Ethiopians  of  Hayti — men  who  were  the  slaves  of 
yesterday — to  be  independent?'  They  tried  with  might  and 
main  to  retake  Hayti  and  wrest  Independence  from  the 
Haytians:  but  Toussaint-L'Ouverture,  few  though  his 
Haytian  soldiery  were,  prevailed  everywhere,  an  uncon- 
ditional surrender  alone  saving  the  crestfallen  Britishers 
and  Spaniards  from  destruction  by  the  Haytian  bayonets. 

Toussaint  the  Great  won  Liberty  for  his  countrymen  in 
1794,  but  it  was  nearly  1800  before  he  gained  absolute  and 
unqualified  Independence. 

Unfortunately,  Corsican  Bonaparte  was  bent,  for  sundry 
reasons,  on  re-conquering  San  Domingo,  and  for  this  pur- 
pose the  French  First  Consul  organized  and  despatched  a 
squadron  of  fifty-four  sail  of  the  line,  under  his  brother- 
in-law,  General  Leclerc,  and  Admiral  Villaret  Joyeuse,  to 
San  Domingo,  with  orders  to  re-establish  slavery  in  San 
Domingo  on  its  reduction  beneath  French  sway.  Such 
proceedings  on  the  part  of  the  French  were  unprecedented 
and  unsurpassed,  as  they  have  never  been  followed. 

The  Americans  extorted  Independence  from  stubborn 
Britishers,  but  the  British,  to  their  credit,  did  not  try  to 
retake  the  United  States  when  their  arms  were  free  to  be 
directed  in  any  direction,  particularly  in  a  weak  direction. 

The  Spanish-American  Colonists,  after  they  had  become 
Independent  Nations,  were  not  molested  by  the  Castilian. 


w 

The  B( 


/?EPA  TRIA  TION  A  ND  LIBERIA .  315 


'he  Belgian,  after  he  had  driven  the  slow-moving  Dutch- 
man from  his  country  and  wrested  Independence  from  him, 
was  not  subjected  to  annoyances  from  the  Hollanders. 

The  Transvaal  Boers,  after  they  had  been  given  Indepen- 
dence consequent  on  Amajuba,  a  decisive  battle  and  well- 
fought  field,  were  not  subjected  to  annoyances  at  the  hands 
of  the  Britishers.  But  the  Haytians  were  more  than  annoyed 
by  the  French. 

We  say  that  Napoleon  sent  a  formidable  expedition 
against  San  Domingo ;  but  the  conquering  Toussaint  the 
Great,  though  a  price  was  set  upon  his  head  and  he  was 
declared  an  outlaw  by  the  French,  was  equal  to  the 
occasion.  He  was  the  most  active  man  in  Hayti,  in 
addition  to  being  the  most  capable  and  the  most  indefatig- 
able. He  gathered  the  '  thin  red  lines '  of  his  Haytians 
around  him,  and  issued  (on  December  18,  1801)  a  counter- 
proclamation  against  Napoleon's  insolent  and  arrogant  edict 
for  the  re-establishment  of  slavery  in  San  Domingo. 

There  were  sieges ;  there  were  burnings ;  there  were 
marches  and  counter-marches ;  there  were  bivouacs,  and 
whole  nights  under  arms ;  there  were  laying  wastes ;  there 
were  skirmishes  ;  there  were  battles  stout  and  long  and 
hotly  contested. 

Still  Toussaint  the  Great  fought  on  and  on.  Was  he  not 
a  hero  and  a  master  of  the  art  of  war  as  well  as  that  of 
diplomacy?  And  he  continued  to  harass  them  so  that  the 
Frenchmen  got  sick  and  tired  of  the  war,  and  were  fain  to 
cry  '  Enough  !'  They  offered  him,  and  Toussaint  the  Great 
accepted,  peace  on  his  own  terms. 

The  Treaty,  following  in  the  wake  of  the  Peace,  of 
course,  could  only  have  been  an  honourable  one  to 
L'Ouverture  the  Liberator ;  for  what  Treaty  or  what  Peace 
other  than  an  honourable  one  has  the  Great  Toussaint  ever 
concluded  ? 


3i6  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

The  principal  Terms  of  the  Treaty  provided  that  (i) 
Toussaint  the  Great  was  to  be  Governor  and  Commander- 
in-Chief  of  San  Domingo  or  Hayti  for  life,  with  power 
to  name  his  successor ;  that  (2)  the  French  General  Leclerc 
was  to  reside  in  San  Domingo  as  Agent  representing  the 
First  Republic ;  that  (3)  all  Toussaint  the  Great's  Haytian 
officers  were  to  retain  their  rank  and  command  in  the 
French  Army  of  San  Domingo ;  that  (4)  slavery  was  to  be 
perpetually  abolished  in  San  Domingo. 

The  Treaty  concluded  between  Leclerc  and  Toussaint 
L'Ouverture  the  Great  was,  however,  only  a  cloak  for  French 
perfidy  of  the  deepest  dye.  The  F'rst  Consul,  Bonaparte, 
had  given  his  brother-in-law,  Leek  '  ^  orders  to  seize 

Toussaint  L'Ouverture  alive  where  ^.1    he  could. 

Said  the  Frenchman,  Napoleon :  H  jares  he  try  to  act 
the  part  of  Liberator  of  San  Domingo,  as  German  Arminius 
did  thousands  of  years  before  him  for  his  Germany,  and  as 
American  George  Washington  did  for  the  United  States  a 
score  of  years  before  ?  We,  said  Napoleon,  must  '  suppress  ' 
him.  And  do  you,  Leclerc,  bring  the  First  of  the  Blacks  to 
France  alive  or  dead  ;  it  is  your  duty —  ?is  our  commission. 

And  Leclerc,  to  his  shame,  and  teethe  shame  of  the 
Corsican,  if  either  could  be  said  to  ha  'e  had  any  shame, 
carried  out  to  the  letter  his  commissior  It  was  early  in 
the  year  (1802)  when  General  Leclerc'  selected  General 
Brunet,  one  of  his  chief  officers,  to  carry  out  his  unworthy 
commission.  The  seizure  by  the  Frenchman  was  eff"ected 
in  this  way :  Brunet  invited  Toussaint  to  a  friendly  confer- 
ence midway  between  Sancey  and  Gonaives  on  the  loth  of 
June,  1802.  The  unsuspecting  L'Ouverture,  relying  on  the 
honour  and  good  faith  of  the  Frenchman,  with  his  noble, 
fearless  and  soldierly  mind,  for  was  he  not  a  preux 
chevalier,  the  Bayard  sans  peur  et  sa?is  reproche  of  Hayti  ? 
entertained  no  mistrust,  and  accepted  the  invitation  and 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  317 

attended  the  conference  at  the  rendezvous  on  the  day 
named.  But  while  he  was  thus  engaged,  Brunet,  with  true 
Gallic  perfidy,  disarmed  L'Ouverture's  handful  of  body- 
guard, and  seized  the  First  and  Greatest  of  the  Haytians, 
the  Liberator  of  San  Domingo.  So  he  whom  they  could 
not  crush  or  subdue,  was ;  treacherously  seized  by  pledge- 
breaking  Frenchmen,  and  conveyed  as  a  close  prisoner 
to  France,  which  was  the  implacable  enemy  of  him  and  his 
country.  They  had  caught  the  lion  in  their  snare,  but  the 
Frenchmen  never  succeeded  in  turning  L'Ouverture's  proud 
and  lofty  spirit.  The  Corsican  incarcerated  the  Haytian  in 
an  Alpine  dungeon  in  the  Castle  of  Joux,  near  Besan9on, 
where  Toussaint.  -  '  nd  more  than  ordinary  conqueror, 

and  more  th  jirtyr,  perished  of  cold  and  starva- 

tion, if  not  of  Uc*.  /and  more  sinister  agencies,  at  the 
hands  of  the  Frenchman,  the  then  First  Consul  Bonaparte, 
on  April  27,  1803. 

Toussaint's  treacherous  seizure,  imprisonment  in  a  cold 
Alpine  dungeon  an4  death  from  starvation,  are  foul  blots 
on  the  reputation  r*"  Napoleon.  His  fate  is  unparalleled  in 
history  sn  ^^  deals  with  Liberators.      None  save  a 

hit  rrican  could  have  experienced  the  fate 

which  the  x-  ^  Liberator   met   at   the   hands   of  the 

French.  Only  r  f^lack — an  African — Liberator  could  have 
met  with  such  a  ate.  And  are  we  not  justified  in  saying 
this?  In  the  first  place,  did  Arminius,  the  Liberator  of 
Germany,  experience  maltreatment  at  the  hands  of  the 
Romans  for  freeing  Germany  from  their  yoke?  But  the 
Haytian  Liberator  did  at  the  hands  of  the  French. 

In  the  second  place,  did  George  Washington  suffer  ill- 
treatment  at  the  hands  of  the  British  because  he  freed  his 
country  from  their  rule  ?  On  the  contrary,  no  American, 
we  shall  say,  no  foreigner,  is  held  in  greater  honour  amongst 
Britishers  than  George  Washington. 


3i8  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

In  the  third,  fourth  and  fifth  places,  Simon  Bolivar,  San 
Martin  de  Jose,  Iturbide,  the  Liberators  of  Spanish 
America,  as  we  before  pointed  out,  were  not  in  revenge 
treacherously  seized  and  ill-treated  by  the  Spaniards, 
though  the  Castilians  were  strong  enough  to  do  it,  just  as 
the  British  were  strong  enough  to  entrap  Washington  and 
convey  him  to  Britain  if  they  had  wished  it. 

In  the  sixth  place,  we  hear  that  the  Belgians  have  had 
their  Liberator,  but  it  is  not  recorded  in  history  that  the 
Dutchmen  treacherously  seized  and  ill-treated  the  Belgian 
Liberator.  Nor  does  history  tell  us,  in  the  seventh  place, 
that  the  Liberator  of  the  Greeks,  for  taking  up  arms  against 
the  Turkish  Crescent,  was  ensnared  and  put  to  death  by  slow 
or  quick  methods.  While  we  have  pointed  out  that,  in  the 
eighth  place,  the  Liberator  of  the  Transvaal,  Boer  Joubert, 
who  inflicted  a  defeat  on  the  British  Lion  at  Amajuba  Hill, 
did  not  experience  any  calamitous  fate.  He  did  not  ex- 
perience at  the  hands  of  the  British  the  fate  which  Tous- 
saint  the  Great,  Liberator  of  San  Domingo  or  Hayti,  met 
with  at  the  hands  of  the  French.  And  the  British,  so  far 
from  entertaining  any  animosity  against  Joubert,  who  gave 
Independence  to  the  Transvaal,  went  to  the  length  of  giving 
a  dinner  in  his  honour  on  December  ii,  1890,  when 
the  gallant  Boer  gentleman,  the  Transvaal  Liberator  and 
General,  was  paying  a  visit  to  the  British  Metropohs. 

But  the  Frenchmen  did  not  wreak  their  vengeance  on 
Toussaint  L'Ouverture  the  Great  alone  :  for  after  the  demise 
of  the  Haytian  Liberator  L'Ouverture's  family  were  also 
confined  to  prison  at  Brienne-en-Agen,  where  one  of  his  sons 
died,  while  his  widow  in  181 6  expired  there  in  the  arms  of 
her  two  remaining  sons,  Isaac  and  Placide  Toussaint  L'Ouver- 
ture, as  a  state  prisoner  of  perfidious  France.  But  the 
awful  and  mysterious  Adrastea,  retributive  Nemesis,  avenged 
the  cruel,  brutal  and  disgraceful  wrongs  heaped  upon  the 


REPA  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  319 

Great  Toussaint,  and  the  Toussaint  Family,  not  only  in  the 
persons  of  the  Bonaparte  Family,  but  in  the  persons  of 
Frenchmen  in  general.  For  though  First  Consul  Bona- 
parte mounted  the  Imperial  Throne  of  the  French,  he 
found  himself  at  Leipsic,  and  in  the  year  of  Leipsic,  not 
only  deprived  of  all  his  conquests,  and  his  brothers,  other 
kinsmen  and  intimate  friends,  driven  from  thrones  and 
power,  but  he  was,  after  being  driven  from  burning  Moscow 
with  humiliating  loss,  pursued  by  the  aggressive  and 
harassing  Muscovite  hordes  of  the  White  Czar,  humbled  at 
Leipsic,  and  imprisoned  at  Elba.  He  returned  from  Elba  not 
only  to  fight,  but  to  be  defeated  ;  not  only  to  be  defeated,  but 
to  have  his  Frenchmen  almost  annihilated  at  Waterloo  by 
the  omnipotent  allies.  Waterloo,  for  Napoleon's  French- 
men, was  not  a  battle,  but  a  massacre — at  least,  from  the 
time  when  the  Prussian  Bliicher  reinforced  the  British 
Wellington.  He  was  crushed  at  Waterloo  only  to  abdicate 
the  French  Imperial  Throne  at  Fontainebleau.  He  by 
compulsion  laid  aside  the  Imperial  Diadem,  but  it  was 
only  to  be  conveyed  a  prisoner  for  the  term  of  his  natural 
life  to  St.  Helena,  an  African  island,  where  the  executioner 
and  oppressor  of  Toussaint  the  Great  died  in  1821. 

Nemesis  the  Avenger  punished  Frenchmen  and  the 
Napoleons  in  other  ways  also.  For  the  son  and  heir  of  the 
First  Napoleon,  the  King  of  Rome  and  Duke  of  Reichstadt, 
never  reigned  over  France.  He  died  in  the  land  of  his 
grandfather  more  or  less  an  Austrian  state  prisoner. 

Retribution  also  overtook  the  Frenchmen  in  1870-71. 
For  Napoleon  III.,  '  the  nephew  of  his  uncle,'  was  conveyed 
a  prisoner  to  Prussia  and  incarcerated  in  a  castle  of  the 
Teuton  after  Sedan.  Frenchmen  lost  not  only  men,  and 
not  only  met  with  humiliating  defeats  and  experienced  dis- 
graceful surrenders  by  their  soldiers,  but  they  were  also 
compelled  to  hand  over  the  whole  of  Alsace,  and  a  great 


320  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

part  of  Lorraine,  to  their  German  conquerors  ;  while  the 
victorious  Teutons,  in  the  pride  of  victory,  also  extorted  a 
heavy  war  indemnity  from  the  crest-fallen  Gauls.  Did  not 
*the  grand-nephew  of  his  grand-uncle,'  the  French  Prince 
Imperial,  meet  with  his  death  at  the  hands  of  the  Zulus — men 
of  the  same  Ethiopian  race  as  Toussaint  L'Ouverture — at 
Isandhwlana  in  1879?  And  may  we  add  here,  that  the 
power  of  the  Bonapartes  in  France  at  present  is  not  by  any 
means  of  importance,  and  that  the  heir  of  the  First  Napoleon 
is  an  uncrowned  Emperor  living  in  constrained  exile  ? 

The  Frenchmen  evidently  under-estimated  the  capacities 
of  the  Haytians  for  organization.  They  found  out  their  mis- 
take to  their  cost  when  it  was  too  late;  and  bitterly  did  they 
repent  of  their  blunder.  And  the  blunder  of  the  French- 
men was  this :  They  treacherously  seized,  wrongfully  in- 
carcerated, and  feloniously  brought  about  the  death  of  the 
Haytian  Chief,  thinking  thus  to  crush  the  spirit  of  the 
Haytians  in  their  struggles  for  Independence.  For,  said  the 
Frenchmen,  if  we  only  take  their  Chief  out  of  the  way, 
affairs  will  proceed  smoothly  with  us,  and  our  work  will  be 
downhill  and  easy;  only  remove  their  idolized  Chieftain 
from  off  the  scene,  and  there  will  not  be  found  the  Leader 
who  will  have  the  courage  or  the  capacity  to  lead  the 
Haytians  on  any  further  struggle  for  Independence.  But 
the  Frenchmen  reckoned  without  their  host.  And,  fortu- 
nately for  the  Haytians  and  the  African  Race  in  general, 
they  blundered  when  they  left  the  swift,  the  agile,  the  inde- 
fatigable, the  talented,  and  fearless  Jacques  Dessalines  in 
San  Domingo  alive  and  at  large,  and  occupying  one  of  the 
chief  commands  in  the  French  Army  of  Hayti.  For  the 
distinguished  and  fearless  Dessalines  rose  and  flew  to  arms 
with  his  Haytians  only  six  months  after  the  demise  of  their 
beloved  Chief.  They  rose  in  their  might  in  October,  1803, 
fought  the  Gauls,  won  battle   after  battle,  captured  town 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA .  32 1 

after  town,  fort  after  fort,  from  the  Frenchmen.  But  the 
ever-memorable  battle  of  St.  Mark,  the  Amajuba  of  French- 
men, brought  untold  and  humiliating  disasters  on  the  French 
arms.  It  was  fought  in  November,  1803.  Dessalines  com- 
manded in  person.  There  the  European  and  the  Africo- 
West  Indian,  the  Caucasian  and  the  Ethiopian,  the  Gaul 
and  the  Haytian,  met  face  to  face  on  equal  terms  and  on  a 
well-planned  field.  The  veterans  of  Napoleon  were  pitted 
against  the  veterans  of  Toussaint ;  but  the  former  were 
eclipsed  by  the  latter.  That  battle,  which  tested  the 
superiority  of  the  black  man  over  the  white  man,  freed  the 
Haytians,  for  the  victorious  troops  of  Dessalines  compelled 
the  Frenchmen  to  evacuate  San  Domingo  in  November  of 
the  same  year  (1803).  Is  it  not  hard  to  believe  that  the 
Spaniards  tried  their  hand  in  recovering  the  western  portion 
from  the  grasp  of  Dessalines,  though  the  Haytians  had  pro- 
claimed their  Independence  ?  Is  it  not  hard  also  to  beHeve 
that  France  never  recognised  the  Independence  of  Hayti 
till  the  year  1825,  though  they  were  driven  finally  from  San 
Domingo  in  1803  ?  Frenchmen  recognised  the  Inde- 
pendence of  San  Domingo  only  so  late  as  1825,  but  on  what 
condition?  On  the  condition  that  the  Haytians  should  en- 
gage to  pay  150,000,000  francs,  or  ^^6,000,000,  to  the 
avaricious  and  insatiable  Frenchmen. 

Britain  did  not  take  so  long  a  time  to  recognise  the  Inde- 
pendence of  the  United  States  of  North  America.  Spain 
did  not  take  so  long  a  time  to  recognise  the  Indepen- 
dence of  Spanish  America.  Holland  did  not  take  so 
long  a  time  to  recognise  the  Independence  of  Belgium. 
Turkey  did  take  so  long  a  time  to  recognise  the  In- 
dependence of  Greece.  Britain  did  not  take  so  long 
a  time  to  recognise  the  Independence  of  the  Transvaal 
as  the  Frenchmen  took  to  recognise  the  Independence 
of  Hayti.     And  why  was  it  so?     The  Haytians  were,  and 

21 


322  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

are,  Ethiopians;  but  the  Americans,  the  Greeks,  the  Belgians, 
the  Transvaal  Boers,  the  Spanish  Americans  (partly)  were, 
as  they  are,  white.  At  the  same  time  the  Yankees  had  to 
pay  no  indemnity  to  Britain  ;  the  Spanish  Americans  had 
to  pay  no  indemnity  to  Spain;  the  Belgians  had  to  pay  no  in- 
demnity to  the  Hollanders  ;  the  Greeks  had  to  pay  no  in- 
demnity to  the  turbaned  Turks  ;  the  Transvaal  Boers  had  to 
pay  no  indemnity  to  Britishers  as  the  price  of  their  Indepen- 
dence. But  the  Haytians  (alack-a-day  for  the  Haytians !  alack- 
a-day  for  the  African — the  African  Race  in  general !)  had  to 
pay  150,000,000  francs,  and  no  less,  to  the  Frenchmen  as  the 
price  of  their  Independence.  As  white  rule  over  the  black 
means  injustice  and  cruelty,  we  cannot  help  reflecting  that 
it  was  better  for  them  to  have  paid  150,000,000  francs,  or 
even  more,  to  the  Frenchmen  rather  than  have  allowed  them 
(the  Frenchmen)  to  reinstate  their  rule  over  the  Haytians 
again.  Is  it  not  hard  to  believe  that  Britain  did  not 
acknowledge  the  Independence  of  the  Haytian  People 
until  1850  ?  But  the  fact  is  so.  When  Belgium  proclaimed 
her  Independence  of  Holland,  Britain  immediately  acknow- 
ledged it.  Britain  not  only  acknowledged  the  Indepen- 
dence of  Greece,  but  even  sent  British  men,  British 
money,  British  ships  with  British  munitions  of  war  to  the 
help  of  the  Hellenes.  While  the  Independence  of  Spanish 
America  and  the  Transvaal  were  acknowledged  almost  im- 
mediately by  the  Britishers,  and  we  know  that  they  sent 
men,  money,  ships  and  arms  to  the  assistance  of  the  former 
when  she  was  bravely  battling  with  Spain. 

The  present  attitude  of  the  white  towards  the  black,  where 
the  former  rules,  is  treated  in  the  First,  Second,  and  Fifth 
Chapters  of  this  work.  From  one  white  Anglo-Saxon  race 
we  can  form  an  estimate  of  the  whole  white  race.  And  is 
it  reasonable  for  the  African  to  dream,  and  for  Laird  Clowes 
to  suppose,  that  the  white  man's  Government  will  some  day 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  323 

(say  in  the  near  future)  spontaneously,  and  in  a  philan- 
thropic spirit,  offer  to  take  the  African  expatriates  from 
America  to  their  Fatherland  Africa? 

Because  Cetewayo,  the  renowned  King  of  the  Zulus,  was 
fearless  and  patriotic  enough  to  take  up  arms  in  1879  to 
assert  his  rights  and  maintain  the  integrity  of  his  Kingdom, 
and  repel  the  British  invaders  of  his  dominions ;  and 
because  he  inflicted  humiliating  and  disastrous  defeats  on 
the  British  arms  at  Isandhwlana,  Inyezane,  Intombi  River, 
and  Hloblane  Mountain  and  elsewhere,  he  was,  after 
Ulundi,  treacherously  seized  at  durbar,  conveyed  a  close 
prisoner  of  state  to  Britain,  had  his  Kingdom  taken  away 
from  him  and  divided,  and  his  son.  Prince  Dinizulu,  was 
deprived  of  the  Royal  Heritage  of  Zululand. 

Because  Dinizuli,  King  Cetewayo's  son  and  heir,  rose  in 
arms  to  vindicate  his  rights  in  Zululand  he  was  taken 
prisoner,  and  after  undergoing  a  mock  trial  was,  together 
with  many  of  his  vassal  Chieftains,  transported  to  the 
Island  of  St.  Helena  by  the  British  to  go  through  a  long 
term  of  imprisonment. 

The  conduct  of  the  British  towards  His  Opoban  Majesty 
King  Ja  Ja  is  one  of  the  worst  on  record.  Ja  Ja  of 
Opobo,  after  he  was  treacherously  seized  at  durbar  by 
Consul  Johnston,  for  no  just  cause,  on  the  West  Coast  of 
Africa,  was  banished  to  the  British  West  Indian  Island  of 
St.  Vincent,  and  thence  to  Barbadoes,  another  British 
West  Indian  Island.  In  an  article  on  '  England's  Honour,' 
in  a  widely-read  and  influential  British  journal,  the  dis- 
honourable action  of  British  Consul  Johnston  towards 
Opoban  Ja  Ja  is  thus  dealt  with  : 

'It  is  now' (May  i,  189 1)  '  nearly  three  years  since  we 
deemed  it  our  duty  to  direct  attention  to  the  action  of  Mr. 
Consul  Johnston  in  seizing  and  deporting  an  African  Chief, 
Ja  Ja.     At  that  time  Mr.  Johnston  was  Consul  on  the  West 

2 1 — 2 


324  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

Coast,  and  he  was  called  upon  to  settle  a  quarrel  between 
the  traders  and  the  Chief.  It  is  not  necessary  for  our 
purpose  to  enter  into  the  merits  of  the  dispute.  It  is 
sufficient  to  say  that  Ja  Ja  claimed  rights  over  the  oil 
districts,  which  were  scouted  by  the  traders,  ridiculed  by 
Mr.  Johnston,  but  partly  admitted  by  Lord  Salisbury,  then, 
as  now.  Foreign  Minister.  Right  was  on  the  side  of  the 
Chief,  and  Mr.  Johnston  knew  it.  But  the  Consul  is 
a  man  of  resource,  untrammelled  by  scruples.  Beaten  in 
argument,  he  summoned  a  man-of-war ;  but  a  warship 
cannot  do  much  injury  to  a  Chief  who  has  no  towns  to 
destroy,  and  can  paddle  into  the  interior  of  a  country 
known  only  to  his  own  people.  And  this  is  what  Ja  Ja  was 
about  to  do  when  Mr.  Johnston  summoned  treachery  to 
his  aid.  He  invited  the  Chief  to  a  conference.  "  We 
have  been  quarrelling  long  enough,"  said  the  Consul.  "  I 
have  written  despatches  innumerable ;  you  have  replied ; 
the  traders  have  rejoined ;  Lord  Salisbury  has  had  his  say, 
and  we  are — as  we  were.  Meet  me  in  my  tent,  and  we 
will  settle  our  differences  as  becomes  friends."  But  Ja  Ja 
was  suspicious.  He  would  come,  he  said,  but  not  without 
a  safe-conduct.  The  safe-conduct  was  given,  and  Ja  Ja 
came  to  the  conference  unarmed,  and  almost  unattended. 
No  sooner  there  than  Mr.  Johnston  presented  his  ulti- 
matum. He  told  Ja  Ja  that  he  was  a  pestilent  knave,  who 
had  given  an  infinity  of  trouble,  and  must  go  on  board  the 
man-of-war  in  the  offing,  and  be  taken  to  Accra,  a  thousand 
miles  away,  there  to  stand  his  trial.  Ja  Ja  protested.  He 
was  present  to  negotiate  on  equal  terms,  not  to  be  seized 
and  sent  abroad.  Mr.  Johnston  was  obdurate.  Ja  Ja  then 
reminded  him  of  his  safe-conduct.  And  what  was  Mr. 
Johnston's  answer?  "True;  you  have  a  safe-conduct,  and 
I  will  respect  it.  You  are  free  to  leave.  But  what  can  you 
do  ?     My  boats  have  blocked  your  escape  by  the  river  ;  you 


REPA  TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  325 

cannot  escape  by  land.  I  will  offer  such  a  heavy  reward 
for  your  head  that  your  life  will  not  be  worth  an  hour's 
purchase.  Go  if  you  will,  but  if  you  go,  you  go  to  certain 
death."  Ja  Ja  saw  he  was  trapped.  Sullenly  he  submitted, 
and  was  taken  to  Accra,  where  even  the  judges  who 
tried  him  spoke  well  of  him.  He  is  now  an  exile  in  St. 
Vincent*  *  Mr.  Johnston  won  the  game,  but  it  was  with 
loaded  dice.  He  sullied  England's  honour  by  violating 
a  safe-conduct,  by  doing  that  to  a  savage  which,  if  done 
to  a  civilized  foe,  would  have  branded  him  with  an  indelible 
stigma.' 

Again,  as  indicating  the  far  from  friendly  attitude  of  the 
white  towards  the  African,  no  European  sovereign  would 
for  a  moment  think  of  conferring  a  distinction  and  an 
honour  on  African  crowned  heads,  though  half-civilized  and 
half-wild  Asiatics,  with  the  Sultan  of  Turkey  arid  the 
Khedive  of  Egypt,  have  had  such  honours  and  such  dis- 
tinctions conferred  on  them. 

There  are  exceptions,  however,  to  the  rule  embodied  in 
the  former  part  of  the  above  statement.  For  the  present 
Sultan  of  Zanzibar,  His  Highness  Seyyid  Ali  bin  Said,!  was 
in  thecourseof  last  year  (1890)  dubbed  Knight  Grand  Com- 
mander of  the  Star  of  India ;  but  that  distinction  emanating 
from  the  British  Crown  was  the  price  of,  or  the  bribe  for, 
the  influence  assumed  by  the  Imperial  British  East  India 
Company  over  Zanzibar  in  the  course  of  the  last  year 
(1890).  But  the  only  African,  the  only  African  Ruler,  who 
has  ever  had  a  distinction  or  an  honour  conferred  upon 
him   through    motives   of    disinterestedness   and    genuine 

*  Thanks  to  the  refined  cruelty  of  perfidious  Britishers, 
Opoban  Ja  Ja  is  no  more,  he  having  died  in  July,  1891,  an 
exile  and  a  homeless  man. 

t  We  are  afraid,  however,  that  the  present  Sultan  of  Zanzibar 
is  an  Asiatic — at  least  on  his  father's  side. 


326  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

brotherly  friendship  was  His  Excellency  the  late  Siberian 
President  Gardner,  on  whom,  on  February  ii,  1882,  His 
Majesty  Alfonso  XH.,  the  late  King  of  Spain,  conferred 
the  Knighthood  of  the  Grand  Cross  of  the  Royal  Order  of 
Isabel  the  Catholic.  While  the  only  British  subject  of  the 
Ethiopian  Race  who  has  ever  been  knighted  is  the  Chief 
Justice  of  Barbadoes,  Sir  William  Conrad  Reeves — but  he  is 
only  a  Knight  Bachelor. 

Of  course  these  honours  and  distinctions  are  of  very 
little  moment,  particularly  in  a  country  like  Republican 
Liberia.  Yet  as  Europeans  confer  these  favours  on  one 
another,  and  even  on  semi-barbarous  Asiatics,  the  unen- 
lightened and  retrograding  half- savage  Sultans  of  Turkey 
and  the  Khedives  of  Egypt,  why  not,  in  Heaven's  name, 
extend  these  courtesies  to  the  cultured  Sovereigns  and 
other  Chiefs  of  the  African  or  Ethiopian  Race  in  a  similar 
manner? 

With  all  these  evidences  of  the  attitude  of  the  ruling  white 
towards  the  subject  black  before  him,  any  man  will,  we  shall 
say  any  man  must^  infer  and  maintain  that  for  the  Americo- 
Africans  to  live  on  in  continual  and  paradise-like  dream,  and 
for  Laird  Clowes  to  imagine  that  a  white  Government — the 
Yankee  Government  supported  by  the  white  Governments 
of  Europe — will  some  day,  spontaneously,  and  grateful  for 
unrequited  services  rendered  during  slavery,  as  an  atone- 
ment and  a  penance  for  wrongs  heaped  upon  them  in  the 
course  of  the  slave-trade  and  during  slavery,  and  in  a 
philanthropic  spirit,  hurry  to  the  rescue  of  the  African 
freedmen  in  America,  and  arrange  to  send  them  to  their 
Fatherland,  our  Africa,  and  to  her  worthy  daughter  Liberia, 
is  foolish  indeed.  If  the  African  particularly  wishes  to 
leave  the  United  States  for  Africa,  he  must,  as  we  pointed 
out  before,  organize  and  marshal  his  ranks,  and  bring 
pressure  to  bear  on  the  Yankee  Government,  by  first  of  all 


REPA TRIA  TION  AND  LIBERIA.  327 

petitioning  them,  and  if  unsuccessful,  then  by  agitating  as 
energetically  for  Repatriation  and  Liberia  as  Irishmen  did 
towards  the  disestablishment  of  the  Irish  Church  (which 
was  finally  disestablished  on  January  i,  187 1);  and  as 
they  (Irishmen)  are  now  doing  to  obtain  a  grant  of  Home 
Rule. 

The  American  Colonization  Society,  unaided  by  the 
Yankee  Government,  is,  however,  carrying  on  the  work  of 
Liberian  Colonization  with  a  pure  and  praiseworthy  philan- 
thropy. All  honour,  then,  be  to  the  American  Colonization 
Society  ! 

We  have  said,  and  we  have  shown,  in  the  earher  part  of 
this  chapter  and  elsewhere  in  this  work,  that  it  would  be 
to  the  interest  of,  and  that  it  was  of  the  greatest  importance 
to,  the  British,  as  well  as  the  Americo-African,  that  he 
should  help  to  complete  the  Colonization  and  hasten 
the  progress  and  prosperity  of  the  Liberian  Republic  by 
joining  the  '  Lone-Star '  of  Liberia,  and  becoming  her  free 
and  independent  citizen. 

But  if  someone  were  to  say.  It  is  all  very  well  for  us  to 
advise  migration  by  the  British  and  Americo-African  into 
Liberia :  does  the  Liberian  Government  offer  any  material 
incentive  to  Liberian  Immigration  by  non-Liberian  Africans? 
we  should  promptly  answer  that  Liberian  President  John- 
son's Government  is  too  enlightened  and  patriotic,  and 
the  Liberian  Constitution  is  too  Hberal  towards  the  de- 
scendants of  Ham,  not  to  make  suitable  provisions  for  the 
African  Immigrant  into  Liberia.  President  Johnson"^  is  him- 
self a  man  of  no  ordinary  ability,  talents  and  culture.  His 
Government  guarantees  a  free  grant  of  ten  acres  of  fertile 
land  to  every  single  grown-up  person,  and  twenty-five  acres 

*  The  present  Chief  Magistrate  of  Liberia  is  President  J.  J. 
Cheeseman,  Mr.  Johnson  not  seeking  re-election  at  the  end  of 
his  term. 


328  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA. 

of  land  to  every  family  of  Hamitic,  or  African,  descent  who 
elects  to  not  only  reside  in  the  West  African  Republic,  but 
to  become  a  Liberian  citizen  with  liberty  to  purchase  more 
from  the  Government  at  a  reasonable  and  moderate  price. 

We  cannot  conclude  our  work  without  venturing  to 
submit  some  counsel  to  the  gracious  consideration  of  the 
present  or  any  future  Liberian  Government.  Members,  both 
individual  and  aggregate,  of  white  Governments  of  en- 
lightenment and  leading,  in  the  olden  times  as  in  modern 
times,  have  not  thought  it  beneath  them  to  accept  and 
follow  good  counsel  at  the  hands  of  their  inferiors — we 
mean,  of  those  lower  in  rank  or  station  than  themselves, 
when  asked  for  or  voluntarily  offered.  We  do  not  think 
that  a  black  Government,  like  that  of  the  Liberian  Republic, 
progressive,  enlightened  and  patriotic  as  it  is,  can  remain 
indifferent  to  the  advice  which  we  venture  to  voluntarily 
offer  it.  For  we  should  like  to  impress  upon  it  the  fact  that 
greater  exertions  must  be  made  by  the  Liberian  Govern- 
ment if  they  wish  the  non-Liberian  Africans  to  flock  into 
Liberia  and  accelerate  her  progress  and  prosperity.  Immi- 
gration it  was  that  hastened  the  greatness  of  the  United 
States  of  North  America  and  the  Dominion  of  Canada. 

Canadian  Immigration  is  encouraged  by  the  Government. 
The  British  daily  papers  for  February  23  of  this  year(i89i) 
report  that :  'In  addition  to  the  free  grant  of  160  acres  of 
fertile  land,  offered  by  the  Canadian  Government  to  any  male 
adult  of  the  age  of  eighteen  years  and  over  in  Manitoba  and 
the  North-West  Territories,  and  to  the  land  that  may  also 
be  obtained  at  a  moderate  price  in  British  Columbia,  the 
Minister  of  Agriculture  is  now  authorized  to  offer,  until 
further  notice,  the  following  bonuses  to  settlers  from  the 
United  Kingdom  taking  up  land  within  six  months  of  their 
arrival  in  the  country  :  Fifteen  dollars  {^-^  is.  8d.)  to  the 
head  of  a  family,  7  dols.  50  c.  (;^i  los.  lod.)  for  the  wife  and 


REP  A  TRIA  TION  A  ND  LIBERIA .  329 

each  adult  member  of  the  family  (over  twelve  years  of  age), 
and  a  further  sum  of  7  dols.  50  c.  (;£"i  los.  lod.)  to  any 
adult  member  of  the  family  over  eighteen  years  taking  up 
land.  Forms  of  application  for  the  bonuses,  without  which 
no  payments  will  be  made,  may  be  obtained  when  the 
passenger  tickets  are  issued  from  any  authorized  agent  of  the 
Canadian  steamship  lines  in  Great  Britain  and  Ireland,  etc' 

We  are  of  opinion  that  the  example  set  by  the  Canadian 
Government  should  not  be  lost  sight  of,  but  should  more 
or  less  be  followed  by  the  Liberian  Government.  Liberia 
is  much  smaller  and  less  rich  than  the  Dominion  of 
Canada,  we  must  admit.  Still,  we  believe  that  the  example 
set  by  the  Canadian  may  be  followed  by  the  Liberian 
Government  to  some  extent  and  with  some  modifications. 

The  following  may  be  taken  as  our  counsel  to  the  Liberian 
Government :  Does  Liberia  need  non-Liberian  Africans, 
her  kinsmen,  who  are  learned  in  the  '  wisdom  of  the 
Egyptians,'  and  who  are  subject  to  and  living  beneath  the 
sway  of  the  'Egyptians'?  She  does.  Then  she  must 
make  greater  exertions  than  she  has  ever  yet  made.  She 
must  find  the  men  and  the  wisdom  she  needs.  She  offers 
a  free  grant  of  10  acres  of  fertile  land  to  every  Liberian 
Immigrant,  and  also  25  acres  of  the  same  to  every  family 
who  migrates  into  the  Liberian  Republic,  as  an  encourage- 
ment or  incentive  to  Immigration  by  the  non-Liberian  of 
Hamitic  descent.  But  we  say,  How  many  millions  of 
Africans  are  there  who  may  not  know  that  there  is  such 
a  Country,  such  a  Fatherland,  in  existence  as  Liberia? 
Apart  from  that,  we  are  convinced  that  there  are  millions 
of  Africans  who  know  Liberia  only  by  name,  and  nothing 
more.  These,  then,  cannot  know  that  the  Liberian 
Government  pledges  itself  to  give  a  grant  of  10  acres  of 
freehold  land  to  the  African  adult,  and  25  acres  of  the  same 
to  the  African  family  who  migrates  into  Liberia.    What,  may 


330  THE  LONE-STAR  OF  LIBERIA, 

we  be  permitted  to  ask,  is  the  cure  for  that  disease  of 
ignorance,  what  is  the  remedy,  what  the  panacea?  We 
believe  we  know  the  remedy ;  and  we  believe  that  a  better 
state  of  things  can  be  brought  about  in  this  way :  In  the 
first  place  let  the  Liberian  Government  appoint  Liberian 
Immigration  Agents*  in  all  the  English-speaking  countries 
where  the  Africans  abound — say,  in  British  Africa,  in  the 
United  States  of  North  America,  British  America  (including 
the  British  West  Indies)  and  Australasia — with  orders  and 
powers  to  set  up  in  the  post-offices  or  otherwise,  and  put 
into  circulation,  Liberian  Immigration  Notices  for  the 
benefit  and  information  of  the  Africans. 

The  above  is  to  be  construed  as  one  of  the  chief  points 
of  advice  we  should  like  to  give  the  Liberian  Government. 
This  will  enable  the  Immigrant  to  know  something  of  Liberia, 
if  he  should  happen  not  to  know  anything  of  her.  There  are 
two  other  points  of  advice  we  should  also  like  to  give  to  the 
Liberian  Government.  In  the  second  place,  as  Liberia 
cannot  afford  to  follow  the  example  of  Canada  and  give  i6o 
acres  of  land  and  bonuses  besides  to  Immigrants,  because 
she  is  neither  as  large  nor  so  rich,  artificially  rich,  as  Canada, 
in  order  that  all  possible  inducements  for  leaving  the  land 
where  the  white  man  rules  and  joining  the  Liberian  Re- 
public by  non-Liberians  of  African  descent  may  be  made  the 
greater  and  keener  and  the  more  effective,  let  the  Liberian 
Government  pledge  themselves  to  give  a  free  grant  of 
twenty  instead  of  ten  acres  of  fertile  land  to  every  grown-up 
person  of  the  age  of  eighteen  years  and  over,  and  let  them 
engage  to  give  a  free  grant  of  fifty  instead  of  twenty-five 
acres  of  fertile  land,  as  is  the  case  at  present,  to  every 
family  of  African  descent. 

In  the  third  place,  let  the  Liberian  Government  charter  a 

*  Liberian  Consuls  might  efficiently  discharge  the  duties  of 
Agents. 


REPATRIATION  AND  LIBERIA.  531 

line  of  Liberian  Immigration  Steamships,  to  be  placed  at 
the  disposal  of  the  Liberian  Immigration  Agents,  and  under 
their  supervision,  with  the  view  of  conveying  to  Liberia 
those  of  the  Africans  who  wish  to  emigrate  at  a  moderate  or, 
if  possible,  very  low  rate,  or  even  free  of  charge,  with  the 
proviso  that  the  Liberian  Immigrant  who  is  conveyed  free 
of  charge  should  be  given  riot  more  than  two  years  within 
which  to  make  up  for  expenses  to  which  the  Liberian 
Government  has  gone  on  his  behalf.  When  the  Govern- 
ment does  these  things,  we  feel  confident  that  the  desired 
results  will  be  achieved  and  brought  about  in  Liberia. 

The  three  points  in  our  advice  to  the  Liberian  Govern 
ment  are,  we  must  admit,  not  easy  things  for  the  powers  that 
be  to  undertake.  But  the  points  embodied  in  the  advice  indi- 
cate a  broad  and  liberal,  and  certainly  a a'/V^,  policy.  Have  the 
Liberian  Government  no  money  to  carry  out  the  broad  and 
liberal  scheme  we  suggest  ?  If  so,  let  them  find  the  money 
somehow  to  carry  out  that  policy,  for  Liberia  has  wonderful 
natural  resources,  as  both  her  friends  and  enemies  testify. 
Of  course  they  must  proceed  gradually,  and  they  should 
proceed  cautiously.  But  we  are  of  opinion  that  it  is  better 
for  the  Liberians  to  proceed  gradually  than  for  them  to 
make  no  attempt  at  all  in  carrying  out  such  a  feasible  policy 
as  is  indicated  in  the  counsel  which  we  make  bold  to  submit 
to  their  consideration.  For  we  fail  to  see  how,  save  it  be  by 
the  Immigration  of  the  English-speaking  Africans,  the  great- 
ness, the  progress  and  the  prosperity  of  Liberia — the  Land 
of  the  Free— the  *  Lone-Star '  of  Liberia,  can  be  accelerated, 
as  it  certainly  should  be,  and  as  every  true  friend  of  the 
African  wishes  it  to  be. 

THE    END. 

Elliot  Stocky  Vatcrnostcr  Row,  London. 


■yyvC 


ETURN 


CIRCULATION  DEPARTMENT 

202  Main  Library 


J 


DAN  PERIOD  1 
HOME  USE 


ALL  BOOKS  MAY  BE  RECALLED  AFTER  7  DAYS 

1  -month  loans  may  be  renewed  by  calling  642-3405 

6-month  loans  may  be  recharged  by  bringing  books  to  Circulation  Desk 

Renewals  and  recharges  may  be  made  4  days  prior  to  due  date 

DUE  AS.SIAMPED  BELOW- 


UC  INTtRUBKARY 


rvm 


PEB-3^'J84 


U^tV.OFCAL»..BERK 


n.5C6iv8d  In  !nt!  rUhf^"^ '  *^'^n 


U^r.2:'\m 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  BERKELEY 
ORM  NO.  DD6,  60m,  12/80        BERKELEY,  CA  94720 


«ii 


'  U     yJ'-i^  y^ 


i^304076 


THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


